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This  book  must  not 
be  taken  from  the 
Library  building. 


Form  No.  471 


Digitized  by  the  Internet  Archive 

in  2012  with  funding  from 

University  of  North  Carolina  at  Chapel  Hill 


http://archive.org/details/greatsouthrecordking 


THE 


GREAT    SOUTH: 


A   RECORD    OF  JOURNEYS 


LOUISIANA,      TEXAS,      THE      INDIAN      TERRITORY,      MISSOURI,       ARKANSAS, 

MISSISSIPPI,     ALABAMA,      GEORGIA,      FLORIDA,      SOUTH     CAROLINA, 

NORTH:  CAROLINA,    KENTUCKY,    TENNESSEE,    VIRGINIA, 

WEST     VIRGINIA,     AND     MARYLAND. 


BY 

EDWARD    KING. 

PROFUSELY    ILLUSTRATED    FROM    ORIGINAL    SKETCHES 
BY     J    WELLS     CHAMPNEY.      . 


AMERICAN     PUBLISHING     COMPANY, 

HARTFORD,     CONN. 

1875. 


Entered,  according  to  Act  of  Congress,  in  the  year  1874,  by 

Scribner    &    Co. 

In  the  Office  of  the  Librarian  of  Congress  at  Washington,  D.  C. 


Library,  Untv.  of 
North  Carolina 


PREFACE. 


T 


*HIS  book  is  the  record  of  an  extensive  tour  of  observation 
through  the  States  of  the  South  and  South-west  during 
the  whole  of  1873,  and  the  Spring  and  Summer  of  1874. 

The  journey  was  undertaken  at  the  instance  of  the  publishers 
of  Scribners  Monthly,   who  desired  to  present   to  the  public, 
through  the  medium  of  their  popular  periodical,  an  account  of 
the    material   resources,    and    the   present   social    and    political 
condition,   of  the  people  in  the  Southern  States.     The  author 
and  the  artists  associated  with  him  in  the  preparation  of  the 
work,  traveled   more  than  twenty-five  thousand  miles ;    visited 
nearly  every  city  and  town  of  importance  in  the  South ;   talked 
with  men   of  all  classes,  parties  and  colors;    carefully   investi- 
gated manufacturing  enterprises   and  sites ;    studied  the  course 
of  politics  in    each    State    since  the    advent  of  reconstruction; 
explored  rivers,  and  penetrated  into  mountain  regions   hereto- 
fore rarely  visited    by  Northern  men.     They  were  everywhere 
kindly  and  generously  received   by  the  Southern  people;    and 
they  have  endeavored,  by  pen  and  pencil,  to  give  the  reading 
public  a  truthful  picture  of  life  in  a  section  which  has,  since  the 
close  of   a  devastating   war,   been    overwhelmed    by  a  variety 
of  misfortunes,  but   upon  which   the   dawn  of  a  better  day  is 
breaking. 

The  fifteen  ex-slave  States  cover  an  area  of  more  than 
880,000  square  miles,  and  are  inhabited  by  fourteen  millions 
of  people.      The  aim  of  the   author  has  been  to  tell  the  truth 


11 

as  exactly  and  completely  as  possible  in  the  time  and  space 
allotted  him,  concerning  the  characteristics  of  this  region  and 
its  inhabitants. 

The  popular  favor  accorded  in  this  country  and  Great 
Britain  to  the  fifteen  illustrated  articles  descriptive  of  the  South 
which  have  appeared  in  Scribner's  Monthly,  has  led  to  the 
preparation  of  the  present  volume.  Much  of  the  material 
which  has  appeared  in  Scribner  will  be  found  in  its  pages ;  the 
whole  has,  however,  been  re-written,  re-arranged,  and,  with 
numerous  additions,  is  now  simultaneously  offered  to  the  English- 
speaking  public  on  both  sides  of  the  Atlantic. 

To  the  talent  and  skill  of  Mr.  J.  Wells  Champney,  the 
artist  who  accompanied  the  author  during  the  greater  part  of 
the  journey,  the  public  is  indebted  for  more  than  four  hundred 
of  the  superb  sketches  of  Southern  life,  character,  and  scenery 
which  illustrate  this  volume.  The  other  artists  who  have  con- 
tributed have  done  their  work  faithfully  and  well. 

New  York,  November,  1874. 


A 


DEDICATION 


TO    MR.    ROSWELL-SMITH, 

Scribiicr  &fi  Co.,  654  Broadway,  Neiu   York. 

My  Dear  Sir : —  You  have  been  from  first  to  last  so  inseparably 
as  well  as  pleasantly  connected  with  "The  Great  South"  enterprise, 
that  I  cannot  forbear  taking  this  occasion  to  thank  you,  not  only  for 
originally  suggesting  the  idea  of  a  journey  of  observation  through 
the  Southern  States,  but  also  for  having  generously  submitted  to  the 
enlargement  of  the  first  plan's  scope,  until  the  undertaking  demanded 
a  really  immense  outlay. 

I  am  sure  that  thousands  of  people  will  tmite  with  me  in  testi- 
fying to  you,  and  the  gentlemen  associated  with  you,  their  thanks 
for  the  lavish  expenditure  which  has  procured  the  beautiful  series  of 
engravings  illustrating  this  volume.  What  I  have  been  able  only 
to  hint  at,  the  artists  have  interpreted  with  a  fidelity  to  life  and 
nature  in  the  highest  degree  admirable. 

I  herewith  present  you  the  result  of  the  joint  labor  of  author  and 
artists,  uThe  Great  South"  volume.  Permit  me,  sir,  to  dedicate  it 
to  you,  and  by  means  of  this  humble  tribitte  to  express  my  admiration 
for  the  energy  and  tmsparing  zeal  with  which  you  have  carried  to 
completion  the  largest  enterprise  of  its  kind  ever  imdertaken  by  a 
monthly  magazine. 

Sincerely  Yours, 

EDWARD    KING. 

.  November  i,  1874. 


r  / 


CONTENTS 


PAGE. 

Preface ! 


Dedication 


3 


I Louisiana,  Past  and  Present 17 

II .The  French  Quarter  of  New  Orleans — The  Revolution  and  its  Effects.  . .  28 

III. The  Carnival— The    French  Markets 38 

IV The  Cotton  Trade — The  New  Orleans  Levees 50 

V The  Canals  and  the  Lake — The  American  Quarter 59 

VI On  the  Mississippi   River — The  Levee  System — Railroads — The  Fort  St. 

Philip  Canal 67 

VII The  Industries  of  Louisiana — A  Sugar  Plantation — The  Teche  Country.  . .   78 

VIII The  Political  Situation  in  Louisiana 89 

IX "Ho!   for  Texas" — Galveston 99 

X A  Visit  to  Houston no 

XI Pictures  from  Prison  and   Field 117 

XII Austin,  the  Texan   Capital — Politics — Schools 127 

XIII The  Truth  About  Texas  —  The  Journey  by  Stage  to  San  Antonio 137 

XIV Among  the  Old  Spanish  Missions 147 

XV The  Pearl  of  the  South-west 157 

XVI The  Plains  —  The  Cattle  Trade 167 

XVII Denison — Texan   Characteristics 175 

XVIII The  New  Route  to  the   Gulf 186 

XIX The  "  Indian  Territory  " 197 

XX Railroad  Pioneering — Indian  Types  and  Character 204 

XXI Missouri — St.  Louis,  Past  and  Present 215 

XXII St.  Louis  Germans  and  Americans  —  Speculative  Philosophy — Education...  222 

XXIII Commerce  of  St.  Louis — The  New  Bridge  over  the  Mississippi 230 

XXIV The  Mineral  Wealth  of  Missouri 237 

XXV Trade  in  St.  Louis — The  Press — Kansas  City — Along  the  Mississippi — The 

Capital 246 

XXVI Down  the  Mississippi  from   St.  Louis 257 

XXVII  . . .  .Memphis,  the  Chief  City  of  Tennessee — Its  Trade  and  Character 264 

XXVIII  ...The   "Supply"    System    in   the   Cotton   Country,   and   its    Results — Negro 

Labor— Present  Plans    of  Working    Cotton  Plantations— The    Black 
Man  in  the  Mississippi  Valley 270 


VI 

PAGE. 

XXIX Arkansas  —  Its   Resources — Its   People  —  Its  Politics — Taxation — The  Hot 

Springs 278 

XXX Vicksburg    and    Natchez,   Mississippi — Society    and    Politics  — A    Louisiana 

Parish  Jury 287 

XXXI Life  on  Cotton  Plantations 297 

XXXII Mississippi — Its  Towns — Finances — Schools — Plantation  Difficulties 311 

XXXIII  . . .  Mobile,  the  Chief  City  of  Alabama 319 

XXXIV The  Resources  of  Alabama — Visits  to  Montgomery  and  Selma 328 

XXXV Northern  Alabama— The  Tennessee  Valley — Traits  of  Character — Educa- 
tion   339 

XXXVI The  Sand-Hill  Region — Aiken — Augusta 344 

XXXVII. .  .Atlanta — Georgia  Politics — The  Failure  of  Reconstruction 350 

XXXVIII ..  Savannah,  the  Forest  City — The  Railway  System  of  Georgia — Material 

Progress  of  the  State 358 

XXXIX Georgian  Agriculture — "Crackers" — Columbus — Macon — Society — Athens 

— The  Coast 371 

XL The  Journey  to  Florida — The  Peninsula's  History — Jacksonville 377 

XLI Up  the  St.  John's  River — Tocoi — St.  Augustine 383 

XLII St.  Augustine,  Florida — Fort  Marion 390 

XLIII The  Climate  of  Florida — A  Journey  to  Palatka 398 

XLIV Orange  Culture  in  Florida — Fertility  of  the  Peninsula 402 

XLV Up  the  Oclawaha  to    Silver  Spring 408 

XLVI The  Upper  St.  John's — Indian  River — Key  West — Politics — The  New  Con- 
stitution      416 

XLVII South  Carolina — Port  Royal — The  Sea  Islands — The  Revolution 422 

XLVIII ....  On  a  Rice  Plantation  in  South  Carolina 429 

XLIX Charleston,  South  Carolina 438 

L The  Venice  of  America — Charleston's  Politics — A  Lovely  Lowland  City — 

Immigration 444 

LI ,  .The  Spoliation  of  South  Carolina 454 

LII The  Negroes  in  Absolute  Power  460 

LIII The  Lowlands  of  North  Carolina 466 

LIV Among  the  Southern  Mountains — Journey  from  Eastern  Tennessee  to  West- 
ern North  Carolina 474 

LV Across  the  "  Smoky  "  to  Waynesville — The  Master  Chain  of  the  Alleghanies.48o 

LVI The  "  Sugar  Fork  "  and  Dry  Falls — Whiteside  Mountain 490 

LVII Asheville  —  The  French  Broad  Valley — The  Ascent  of  Mount  Mitchell.  .503 

LVIII The  South  Carolina  Mountains  —  Cascades  and  Peaks  of  Northern  Georgia  .515 

LIX Chattanooga,  the  Gateway  of  the  South 527 

LX .Lookout  Mountain — The  Battles  around  Chattanooga  —  Knoxville  —  East- 
ern Tennessee 536 


vn 

PAGE. 

LXI A  Visit  to  Lynchburg  in  Virginia  552 

LXII In  South-western  Virginia — The  Peaks  of  Otter  —  The  Mineral  Springs.  . .  .561 

LXIII Among  the  Mountains — From  Bristol  to   Lynchburg 569 

LXIV Petersburg — A  Negro  Revival  Meeting 579 

LXV  . , The  Dismal  Swamp — Norfolk — The  Coast 588 

LXVI The   Education    of   Negroes  —  The  American  Missionary  Association — The 

Peabody  Fund  —  The  Civil  Rights  Bill 596 

LXVII  . . .  .The  Hampton  Normal  Institute  —  General  Armstrong's  Work — Fisk  Univer- 
sity—  Berea  and  Other  Colleges 603 

LXVIII Negro  Songs  and  Singers 609 

LXIX A  Peep  at  the  Past  of  Virginia — Jamestown — Williamsburg — Yorktown 621 

LXX Richmond  —  Its  Trade  and  Character 626 

LXXI The  Partition  of  Virginia — Reconstruction  and  Politics  in  West  and  East 

Virginia 639 

LXXII  ....  From   Richmond  to  Charlottesville 647 

LXXIII From  Charlottesville  to  Staunton,  Virginia — The  Shenandoah  Valley  — 

Lexington — The   Graves  of  General  Lee  and   "Stonewall"  Jackson  — 

From  Goshen  to  "  White  Sulphur  Springs." 656 

LXXIV ....  Greenbrier  White  Sulphur  Springs  —  From  the  "White   Sulphur"  to  Ka- 
nawha Valley — The  Mineral  Springs  Region 670 

LXXV The  Kanawha  Valley — Mineral  Wealth  of  Western  Virginia 681 

LXXVI ....  Down  the  Ohio  River  —  Louisville 693 

LXXVII  ...  A  Visit  to  the  Mammoth  Cave 699 

LXXVIII . .  The  Trade  of  Louisville 707 

LXXIX. . .  .Frankfort — The  Blue  Grass  Region — Alexander's  Farm — Lexington 713 

LXXX ....  Politics  in  Kentucky — Mineral  Resources  of  the  State 721 

LXXXI ....  Nashville  and   Middle  Tennessee  .- 726 

LXXXII . . .  A  Glance  at  Maryland's-  History — Her  Extent  and  Resources     733 

LXXXIII .  .The  Baltimore  and  Ohio  Railroad 741 

LXXXIV  .  .The  Trade  of  Baltimore — Its  Rapid  and  Astonishing  Growth , 748 

LXXXV  . . .  Baltimore  and  its  Institutions 757 

LXXXVI  ..  Southern    Characteristics— State    Pride — The  Influence  of  Railroads- 
Poor  Whites — Their  Habits 77* 

LXXXVII  .The  Carrying  of  Weapons  —  Moral  Character  of  the  Negroes 777 

LXXXVIII.  Dialect — Forms  of  Expression  —  Diet 784 

LXXXIX  ..  Immigration — The   Need    of   Capital  —  Division   of   the   Negro  Vote  —  The 

Southern   Ladies 792 

XC Rambles     in    Virginia  —  Fredericksburg  —  Alexandria  —  Mount     Vernon  — 

Arlington    795 


ILLUSTRATIONS 


AND      MAPS. 


PAGE. 

Scene  on  the  Oclawaha  River,  Florida — Frontispiece 

General  Map  of  the  Southern  States 15 

Bienville,  the  Founder  of  New  Orleans 17 

The  Cathedral  St.  Louis — New  Orleans 18 

'A  blind  beggar  hears  the  rustling  of  her  gown, 
and  stretches  out  his  trembling  hand  for 
alms," 19 

'A  black  girl  looks  wonderingly  into  the  holy-water 

font " 19 

The  Archbishop's  Palace,  New  Orleans 20 

'  Some  aged  private  dwellings,  rapidly  decaying,"  25 
A  brace  of  old  Spanish  Governors. — From  por- 
traits owned  by  Hon.  Charles  Gayarre,  of  New 
Orleans 26 

'  And  where  to-day  stands  a  fine  Equestrian  Statue 
of  the  Great  General  " 27 

'  A  lazy  negro,  recumbent  in  a  cart  " 29 

'  The  negro  nurses  stroll  on  the  sidewalks,  chatter- 
ing in  quaint  French  to  the  little  children  " . . . .  30 

'  The  interior  garden,  with  its  curious  shrine  " . . . .  31 

'  The  new  Ursuline  Convent,  New  Orleans 32 

'  And  while  they  chatter  like  monkeys,  even  about 
politics,  they  gesticulate  violently  " 35 

'  The  old  French  and  Spanish  cemeteries  present 

long  streets  of  cemented  walls  " 36 

The  St.  Louis  Hotel,  New  Orleans 37 

The  Carnival — "White  and  black  join  in  its  mas- 
querading " ' 38 

'  The  coming  of  Rex,  most  puissant  King  of  Car- 
nival"    40 

'  The  Bceuf-Gras — the  fat  ox — is  led  in  the  proces- 
sion " 41 

'  When  Rex  and  his  train  enter  the  queer  old 
streets,  the  balconies  are  crowded  with  spec- 
tators " 42 

'  The  joyous,  grotesque  maskers  appear  upon  the 
ball-room  floor  " 43 

'  Many  bright  eyes  are  in  vain  endeavoring  to 
pierce  the  disguise  " 45 

'The  French  market  at  sunrise  on  Sunday  morning"  46 

'  Passing  under  long,  hanging  rows  of  bananas 
and  pine-apples  " 47 

'One   sees   delicious    types    in    these    markets"  48 

'  In  a  long  passage,  between  two  of  the  market 
buildings,  sits  a  silent  Louisiana  Indian  wo- 
man"    49 

'  Stout  colored  women,  with  cackling  hens  dang- 
ling from  their  brawny  hands  " 49 

'  These  boats,  closely  ranged  in  long  rows  by  the 
levee  " 5° 


PAGE. 

"  Whenever  there  is  a  lull  in  the  work,  they  sink 

down  on  the  cotton  bales  " 52 

"  Not  far  from  the  levee  there  is  a  police  court, 
where  they  especially  delight  to  lounge  "......  52 

"  The  cotton  thieves  " 55 

"  There  is  the  old  apple  and  cake  woman  " 55 

"The  Sicilian  fruit-seller " 56 

' '  At  high  water,  the  juvenile  population  perches  on 
the  beams  of  the  wharves,  and  enjoys  a  little 

quiet  fishing  " 57 

"  The  polite  but  consequential  negro  policeman,"  57 

The  St.  Charles  Hotel,  New  Orleans 59 

The  New  Basin : 60 

The  old  Spanish  Fort 60 

The  University  of  Louisiana,  New  Orleans 61 

The  Theatres  of  New  Orleans 61 

Christ  Church,  New  Orleans 62 

The  Canal  street  Fountain,  New  Orleans 62 

The  Charity  Hospital,  New  Orleans 63 

The  old  Maison  de  Sante,  New  Orleans 63 

The  United  States  Marine  Hospital,  New  Orleans  64 

Trinity  Church,  New  Orleans 64 

St.  Paul's  Church,  New  Orleans 64 

First  Presbyterian  Church,   New  Orleans 65 

The  Catholic  Churches  of  New  Orleans  —  St.  Jo- 
seph's, St.  Patrick's,  Jesuit  Church  and  School  65 

The  Custom-House,  New  Orleans 66 

The  United  States  Branch  Mint,  New  Orleans ...  66 
"  Sometimes  the  boat  stops  at  a  coaling  station  ". .  68 

"  The  Wasp  " 69 

' '  Some  tract  of  hopelessly  irreclaimable,  grotesque 
water  wilderness. "    (From  a  painting  by  Julio.)  70 
The  monument  on  the  Chalmette  battle-field ....  72 

Light-house,  South-west  Pass 74 

"  Pilot  Town,"  South-west  Pass 75 

' '  A  Nickel  for  Daddy  " tj 

' '  A  cheery  Chinaman  " 82 

Sugar-cane  Plantation — "  The  cane  is  cut  down 

at  its  perfection  " 83 

"  The  beautiful  '  City  Park,'  "  New  Orleans 87 

Map  showing    the  Distribution  of  the   Colored 
Population  of  the  United  States.     (From  the 

U.  S.  Census  Reports) 88 

Map  of  the  Gulf  States  and  Arkansas 89 

The  Supreme  Court,  New  Orleans 92 

The  United  States  Barracks,  New  Orleans 93 

Mechanics'  Institute,  New  Orleans . .  fc 95 

Going  to  Texas 99 

"It  is  only  a  few  steps  from  an  oleander  grove  to 

the  surf" i«* 


X 

PAGE. 

"The   mule-carts  unloading  schooners   anchored 

lightly  in  the  shallow  waves  " 1 103 

"  Galveston  has  many  huge  cotton-presses  " 104 

The  Custom-House,  Galveston 105 

"  Primitive  enough  is  this  Texan  jail  " 106 

The  Catholic  Cathedral,  Galveston 107 

"  Watch  the  negro  fisherman  as  he  throws  his  line 

horizonward  " 108 

"  The  cotton-train  is  already  a  familiar  spectacle 

on  all  the  great  trunk  lines  " no 

"There  are  some  notable  nooks  and  bluffs  along 

the  bayou  " 112 

"The  Head-quarters  of  the   Masonic  Lodges  of 

the  State" 113 

"  The  railroad  depots  are  everywhere  crowded 
with  negroes,  immigrants,  tourists  and  specu- 
lators " 113 

The  New  Market,  Houston 114 

"  The  ragged  urchin  with  his  saucy  face  " 114 

"  The  negro  on  his  dray,  racing  good-humoredly 

with  his  fellows  " 115 

"  The  auctioneer's  young  man  " 116 

Sam  Houston 117 

View  on  the  Trinity  River 118 

"We  frequently  passed  large  gangs  of  the  con- 
victs chopping  logs  in  the  forest  by  the  road- 
side " 119 

"  Satanta    had    seated    himself    on    a    pile    of 

oakum  " 121 

"  As  the  train  passes,  the  negroes  gather  in  groups 
to  gaze  at  it  until  it  disappears  in  the  dis- 
tance " 123 

The  State  Capitol,  Austin 127 

The  State  Insane  Asylum,  Austin 128 

The  Texas  Military  Institute,  Austin 128 

The  Governor's  Mansion,  Austin 129 

The  Alamo  Monument,  Austin 131 

The  Land  Office  of  Texas,  Austin 133 

"  The  emigrant  wagon  is  a  familiar  sight  there  " . .   135 
Sunning   themselves — "A  group   of  Mexicans, 

lounging  by  a  wall  " 140 

"  We  encounter  wagons  drawn  by  oxen  " 141 

"  Here  and  there  we  pass  a  hunter's  camp  " 143 

"We  pass  groups  of  stone  houses  " 146 

"  The  vast  pile  of  ruins  known  as  the  San  Jose 

Mission  " 1 147 

The  old  Concepcion  Mission,  near  San  Antonio, 

Texas 151 

An  old  window  in  the  San  Jose  Mission 155 

"An  umbrella  and  candlestick  graced  the  christen- 
ing font  " 155 

"  The  comfortable  country-house  so  long  occupied 

by  Victor  Considerant " 156 

The   San  Antonio  River — "Its  blueish  current 
flows  in  a  narrow  but  picturesque  channel  " . .   157 

The  source  of  the  San  Antonio  River 157 

San  Pedro  Springs — "  The  Germans  have  estab- 
lished their  beer  gardens  " 158 

"Every  few  rods  there  is  a  waterscape  in  minia- 
ture " 158 

"  The  river  passes  under  bridges,  by  arbors  and 

bath-houses  " 159 

The  Ursuline  Convent,  San  Antonio 159 

St.  Mary's  Church,  San  Antonio 160 


PAGE. 

A  Mexican  Hovel 161 

The  Military  Plaza,  San  Antonio 161 

' '  The  Mexicans  slowly  saw  and  carve  the  great 

stones  " 162 

' '  The  elder  women  wash  clothes  by  the  brookside"  163 

Mexican  types  in  San  Antonio 164 

' '  The  remnant  of  the  old  Fort  of  the  Alamo  " . . . .   165 

"  The  horsemen  from  the  plains  " 167 

"  The  candy  and  fruit  merchants  lazily  wave  their 

fly-brushes  " 168 

A  Mexican  beggar 168 

' '  The  citizens  gather  at  San  Antonio,  and  discuss 

measures  of  vengeance  " 170 

A  Texan  Cattle-Drover 171 

Military  Head-quarters,  San  Antonio 172 

Negro  Soldiers  of  the  San  Antonio  Garrison . . .   173 
Scene  in  a  Gambling  House — "  Playing  Keno," 

Denison,   Texas 175 

"  Men,  drunk  and  sober,  danced  to  rude  music".   176 

"Red  Hall" 178 

The  Public  Square  in  Sherman,  Texas 180 

"  With  swine  that  trotted  hither  and  yon  " 181 

Bridge  over  the  Red  River — (Missouri,  Kansas 

and  Texas  Railway) 182 

The  New  Route  to  the  Gulf 186 

"  The  Pet  Conductor  " 188 

"  Charlie  " 188 

Our  Special  Train 189  1 

' '  A  stock-train  from  Sedalia  was  receiving  a  squeal- 
ing and  bellowing  freight " 190 

"The  old  Hospital,"  Fort  Scott 191 

Bridge  over  the  Marmiton  River,  near  Fort  Scott  192 

A  Street  in  Parsons,  Kansas 193 

A  Kansas  Herdsman : 193 

A  Kansas  Farm-yard 194 

"The  Little  Grave,   with  the  slain  horses  lying 

upon  it " 195 

"The  stone  house  which  the  graceless  Kaw  has 

turned  into  a  stable  for  his  pony  " 195 

"  The  warrior  galloping  across  the  fields  " 196 

Monument  erected  to  the  memory  of  Brevet- 
Major  E.  A.  Ogden,  near  Fort  Riley,  Kansas  196 

An  Indian  Territorial  Mansion 197 

A  Creek  Indian 199 

Bridge  across  the  North  Fork  of  the  Canadian 
River,  Indian  Territory  (M.  K.  and  T.  Railway)  199 

An  Adopted  Citizen .  200 

An  Indian  Stock-Drover 201 

"  The  ball-players  are  fine  specimens  of  men". .  202 

A  Gentleman  from  the  Arkansas  Border 203 

Limestone  Gap,  Indian  Territory 204 

' '  Coming  in  the  twilight  to  a  region  where  great 
mounds  reared  their  whale^backed  heights  " . .  205 

A  ' '  Terminus ' '  Rough 206 

' '  We  came  to  the  bank  of  the  Grand  River,  on  a 
hill  beyond  which  was  the  Post  of  Fort  Gib- 
son " 206 

A  Negro  Boy  at  the  Ferry 208 

' '  We  found  the  ferries  obstructed  by  masses  of 

floating  ice  " 209 

"  They  wore  a  prim,  Shakerish  costume  " 210 

A  Trader  among  the  Indians 210 

"The  Asbury   Manual   Labor    School,"    in    the 

Creek  domain 211 


PAGF\ 

The  Toll-Bridge  at  Limestone  Gap,  Indian  Ter- 
ritory    213 

'  Looking  down  on  the  St.  Louis  of  to-day,  from 

the  high  roof  of  the  Insurance  temple  " 215 

'  Where  now  stands  the  great  stone  Cathedral  ". .  216 

The  old  Chouteau  Mansion  (as  it  was) 217 

The  St.  Louis  Life  Insurance  Company's  Build- 
ing    218 

'  In  those  days  the  houses  were  nearly  all  built  of 

hewn  logs  " 218 

'  The  crowd  awaiting  transportation  across  the 
stream  has  always  been  of  the  most  cosmo- 
politan and  motley  character  " 220 

The  Court-House,  St,  Louis 222 

Thomas    H.    Benton   (for  thirty  years   United 

States  Senator  from  Missouri) 223 

William   T.   Harris,    editor    of   the    St.    Louis 

"  Journal  of  Speculative  Philosophy  " 226 

The  High  School,  St.  Louis 228 

Washington  University,  St.  Louis 229 

The  new  Post-Office  and  Custom-House  in  con- 
struction at  St.  Louis 230 

The  new    Bridge  over  the   Mississippi   at   St. 

Louis 233 

View  of  the  Caisson  of  the  East  Abutment  of 
the  St.  Louis  Bridge,   as  it  appeared  during 

construction 234 

The  building  of  the  East  Pier  of  the  St.  Louis 

Bridge 235 

In  the  "  Cut"  at  Iron  Mountain,  Missouri 237 

At  the  Vulcan  Iron  Works,  Carondelet 238 

The  Furnace,  Iron  Mountain,  Missouri 241 

The  Summit  of  Pilot  Knob,  Iron  County,  Mis- 
souri    243 

The  "Tracks,"  Pilot  Knob,  Missouri 244 

Map  of  Missouri 245 

View  in  Shaw's  Garden,  St.  Louis 246 

Statue  to  Thomas  H.  Benton,  in  Lafayette  Park.  247 
The  "  Four  Courts  "  Building,  St.  Louis. ......  248 

The  Gratiot  Street  Prison,  St.  Louis 248 

First  Presbyterian  Church,  St.  Louis 249 

Christ  Church,  St.  Louis 250 

The  Missouri  Capitol,  at  Jefferson  City 254 

'  The  Cheery  Minstrel  " 255 

The  Steamer  "Great  Republ^"  a  Mississippi 

River  Boat 257 

' '  Down  the  steep  banks  would  come  kaleidos- 
copic processions  of  negroes  and  flour  barrels  "  258 

The  Levee  at  Cairo,  Illinois 259 

An  Inundated  Town  on  the  Mississippi's  bank. .  260 

The  Pilot-House  of  the  "  Great  Republic  " 261 

A  Crevasse  in  the  Mississippi  River's  Banks. . . .  262 
View  in  the  City  Park  at  Memphis,  Tennessee. .  264 
The  Carnival  at  Memphis,    Tennessee — "The 
gorgeous  pageants   of  the  mysterious  Mem- 
phi  " 268 

A  Steamboat  Torch-Basket 277 

View  on  the  Arkansas  River  at  Little  Rock 279 

The  Arkansas  State  Capitol,  Little  Rock 281 

The  Hot  Springs,  Arkansas 286 

Vicksburg,  Mississippi 287 

The  National  Cemetery  at  Vicksburg,  Missis- 
sippi     288 

The  Gamblers'  Graves,  Vicksburg,  Mississippi.   289 


XI 

PAGE. 

Colonel  Vick,  of  Vicksburg,  Mississippi,  Planter  289 

Natchez-under-the-Hill..  Mississippi 291 

View  in  Brown's  Garden,  Natchez,  Mississippi . .  292 
Avenue  in  Brown's  Garden,  Natchez,  Mississippi  293 
A  Mississippi  River  Steamer  arriving  at  Natchez 

in  the  night 294 

'  Sah  ?  " 296 

A  Cotton  Wagon-Train 302 

A  Cotton-Steamer 304 

Scene  on  a  Cotton  Plantation 307 

Baton  Rouge,  Louisiana 3og 

The  Red  River  Raft  as  it  Was 310 

Map  showing  the  Cotton  Region  of  the  United 

States.  (From  the  U.  S.  Census  Reports.). . .  312 
Map  of  South  Carolina,  Georgia,  Florida  and 

Alabama 313 

The  Mississippi  State  Capitol  at  Jackson 313 

'  At  the  proper  seasons,  one  sees  in  the  long  main 

street  of  the  town,  lines  of  emigrant  wagons,"  314 
'  The  negroes  migrate  to  Louisiana  and  Texas  in 

search  of  paying  labor  " 318 

On  the  Bay  Road  near  Mobile,  Alabama «  319 

'  Mobile  Bay  lay  spread  out  before  me  " 320 

'A  negro  woman  fished  silently  in  a  little  pool  "  .  321 

The    Custom-House,  Mobile,  Alabama 322 

Bank  of  Mobile  and  Odd  Fellows'  Hall,  Mobile, 

Alabama 323 

The  Marine  and  City  Hospitals,  Mobile,  Ala 324 

Trinity  Church,  Mobile,  Alabama 324 

In  the  City  Park,  Mobile — ' '  Ebony  nurse-maids 

flirt  with  their  lovers  " 325 

In  the  City  Park,  Mobile — ' '  Squirrels  frolic  with 

the  children  " 326 

Barton  Academy,  Mobile,  Alabama 326 

Christ  Church,  Mobile,  Alabama 327 

The  Alabama  State  Capitol,  at  Montgomery,  332 
The  Market-Place  at  Montgomery,  Alabama. . . .  334 

The  Cotton-Plant 343 

A  Street  Scene  in  Augusta,  Georgia.- 344 

A  Bell-Tower  in  Augusta,  Georgia 347 

A  Confederate  Soldier's  Grave,  at  Augusta,  Ga.  348 

Sunset  over  Atlanta,  Georgia 350 

The  State-House,  Atlanta,  Georgia 353 

An  Up-Country  Cotton- Press 357 

View  on  the  Savannah  River,  near  Savannah, 

Georgia 358 

General  Oglethorpe,  the  Founder  of  Savannah  359 
The  Pulaski  Monument  in  Savannah,  Georgia.  360 

A  Spanish  Dagger-Tree,  Savannah 361 

•  Looking  down  from  the  bluff,"  Savannah 362 

'  The    huge    black    ships   swallowed  bale    after 

bale  " 363 

An  old  Stairway  en  the  Levee  at  Savannah 364 

The  Custom-House  at  Savannah 365 

View  in  Bonaventure  Cemetery,  Savannah 365 

The  Independent  Presbyterian  Church,  Savan- 
nah   366 

View  in  Forsyth  Park,  Savannah 367 

'  Forsyth  park  contains  a  massive  fountain" 368 

A  Savannah  Sergeant  of  Police 369 

General   Sherman's  Head-quarters,  Savannah. .  370 

A  pair  of  Georgia  "  Crackers  " 373 

The  Eagle  and  Phoenix  Cotton-Mills,  Columbus, 

Georgia 373 


Xll 

PAGE. 

The  old  Fort  on  Tybee  Island,  Georgia 375 

Happiness 376 

Moonlight  over  Jacksonville,  Florida 377 

Jacksonville,  on  the  St.  John's  River,  Florida. . .  381 
Residence  of   Mrs.   Harriet  Beecher  Stowe,   at 

Mandarin,  Florida 383 

Green  Cove  Springs,  on  the  St.  John's  River,  Fla.  384 

On  the  Road  to  St.  Augustine,  Florida 386 

A  Street  in  St.  Augustine,  Florida 387 

St.  Augustine,  Florida — "An  ancient  gateway  "  388 

The  Remains  of  a  Citadel  at  Matanzas  Inlet 391 

View  of  Fort  Marion,  St.  Augustine,  Florida. . . .  392 
Light-house  on  Anastasia  Island,  near  St.  Au- 
gustine, Florida 393 

View  of  the  Entrance  to  Fort  Marion,  St.  Au- 
gustine, Florida 394 

"  The  old  sergeant  in  charge  " 395 

The  Cathedral,  St.  Augustine,  Florida 396 

The  Banana — "  At  Palatka,  we  first  found  the 

banana  in  profusion  " 400 

"Just  across  the  river  from  Palatka  lies  the  beau- 
tiful orange  grove  owned  by  Colonel  Hart  "...  402 
Entrance  to  Colonel  Hart's  orange  grove,  oppo- 
site Palatka 404 

The  Guardian  Angel 407 

A  Peep  into  a  Forest  on  the  Oclawaha 409 

' '  We  would  brush  past  the  trees  and  vines  " 410 

The  "  Marion  "  at  Silver  Spring 412 

Shooting  at  Alligators 414 

View  on  the  upper  St.  John's  River,  Florida. . . .  416 
Sunrise  at  Enterprise,  St.  John's  River,  Florida.  419 

A  Country  Cart 421 

View  of  a  Rice-field  in  South  Carolina 429 

Negro  Cabins  on  a  Rice  Plantation 431 

"  The  women  were  dressed  in  gay  colors  " 432 

"  With  forty  or  fifty  pounds  of  rice-stalks  on  their 

heads  " 432 

A  Pair  of  Mule-Boots 434 

A  "Trunk-Minder " 434 

Unloading  the  Rice-Barges 435 

"At  the  winnowing-machine  " 436 

"Aunt    Bransom " — A  venerable  ex-slave  on    a 

South  Carolina  Rice  Plantation 437 

View  from  Fort  Sumter,  in  Charleston  Harbor..  438 

The  old  Charleston  Post-Office 440 

Houses  on  the  Battery,  Charleston 441 

A  Charleston  Mansion 442 

The  Spire  of  St.  Philip's  Church,  Charleston. .  443 

The  Orphan  House,  Charleston 444 

The  Battery,  Charleston 445 

The  Grave  of  John  C.  Calhoun,  Charleston. . . .  446 
The  Ruins  of  St.  Finbar  Cathedral,  Charleston.  447 
"  The  highways  leading  out  of  the  city  are  all  richly 

embowered  in  loveliest  foliage  " 449 

Magnolia  Cemetery,  Charleston 450 

Garden  in  Mount  Pleasant,  opposite  Charleston  452 

Peeping  Through 453 

A  Future  Politician 459 

The  State-House  at  Columbia,  South  Carolina..  460 
Sketches  of  South  Carolina  State  Officers  and 

Legislators  under  the  Moses  Administration. .  462 
Iron  Palmetto  in  the  State-House  Yard  at  Colum- 
bia    465 

A  Wayside  Sketch 473 


'  The  Small  Boy  " 474 

'  The  Judge  " 476 

The  Judge  shows  the  Artist's  Sketch-Book 479 

'  The  family  sang  line  by  line  " 481 

A  Mountain  Farmer 482 

'  We  caught  a  glimpse  of  the  symmetrical  Cata- 

louche  mountain  " 483 

The  Canon   of  the   Catalouche  as    seen    from 

"  Bennett's  " 484 

Mount  Pisgah,  Western  North  Carolina 486 

The  Carpenter — A  Study  from  Waynesville  Life  487 

View  on  Pigeon  River,  near  Waynesville 488 

The  Dry  Fall  of  the  Sugar  Fork,  Blue  Ridge, 

North  Carolina 490 

View  near  Webster,  North  Carolina 492 

Lower  Sugar  Fork  Fall,  Blue  Ridge,  North  Car- 
olina   49S 

The  Devil's  Court-House,  Whiteside  Mountain .  499 

Jonas  sees  the  Abyss S01 

Asheville,  North  Carolina,  from   "  Beaucatcher 

Knob  " 504 

View  near  Warm  Springs,  on  the  French  Broad 

River 506 

Lover's   Leap,    French   Broad    River,   Western 

North  Carolina 508 

View  on  the  Swannanoa  River,  near  Asheville, 

Western  North  Carolina 509 

First  Peep  at  Patton's 510 

The  "Mountain  House,"  on  the  way  to  Mount 

Mitchell's  Summit 511 

View  of  Mount  Mitchell 512 

The  Judge  climbing  Mitchell's  High  Peak 513 

Signal-Station  and  "  Mitchell's  Grave,"  Summit 

of  the  Black  Mountains 514 

The  Lookers-on  at  the  Greenville  Fair 516 

Table  Mountain,  South  Carolina 518 

"  Let  us  address  de  Almighty  wid  pra'r  " 520 

Mount  Yonah,  as  seen  from  Clarksville,  Geor- 
gia '. 521 

The  "Grand  Chasm,"  Tugaloo  River,  Northern 

Georgia 522 

Toccoa  Falls,  Northern  Georgia 524 

A  Mail-Carrier 526 

Mission  Ridge,  near  Chattanooga,  Tennessee..  527 
Lookout  Mountain,  (far  Chattanooga,  Tennessee  529 
The  Mineral  Region  in  the  vicinity  of  Chattanooga  531 
Map  showing  Grades  of  Illiteracy  in  the  United 

States.     (From  the  U.  S.  Census  Reports.). . .  532 
Map  of  Middle  Atlantic  States,  southern  section, 

and  North  Carolina 533 

The  Rockwood  Iron-Furnaces,  Eastern  Tenn- 
essee    533 

The  "John  Ross  House,"  near  Chattanooga. 
Residence  of  one  of  the  old  Cherokee  Land- 
holders     534 

Catching  a  "  Tarpin  " 535 

View  from  Lookout  Mountain  near  Chattanooga  536 

Umbrella  Rock,  on  Lookout  Mountain 537 

Looking  from  "  Lookout  Cave  " 538 

"  Rock  City,"  Lookout   Mountain 539 

View  from  Wood's  Redoubt,  Chattanooga 540 

On  the  Tennessee  River,  near  Chattanooga 542 

The  "  Suck,"  on  the  Tennessee  River 543 

A  Negro  Cabin  on  the  bank  of  the  Tennessee. .  544 


PAGE. 

Knoxville,  Tennessee 546 

The  East  Tennessee  University,  Knoxville 548 

At  the  iEtna  Coal  Mines 550 

"  Down  in  a  Coal  Mine  " 551 

The  old  Market  at  Lynchburg 552 

The  James  River,  at  Lynchburg,  Virginia 553 

A  Side  Street  in  Lynchburg,  Virginia 555 

Scene  in  a  Lynchburg  Tobacco  Factory 557 

"Down  the  steep  hills  every  day  come  the  country 

wagons  " 558 

Summoning  Buyers  to  a  Tobacco  Sale 560 

Evening  on  the  James  River — "The  soft  light 
which  gently  rested  upon  the  lovely  stream  " . .  561 

In  the  Gap  of  the  Peaks  of  Otter,  Virginia 562 

The  Summit  of  the  Peak  of  Otter,  Virginia 564 

Blue  Ridge  Springs,  South-western  Virginia. . . .  566 

Bristol,  South-west'ern  Virginia 569 

White  Top  Mountain,  seen  from  Glade  Springs  570 

Making  Salt,  at  Saltville,  Virginia 571 

Wayside  Types — A  Sketch  from  the  Artist's  Vir-    ■ 

ginia  Sketch-Book 573 

Wytheville,  Virginia 574 

Max  Meadows,  Virginia 575 

The   Roanoke  Valley,  Virginia 576 

View  near  Salem,  Virginia •  577 

View  on  the  James  River  below  Lynchburg 578 

Appomattox  Court-House — "  It  lies  silently  half- 
hidden  in  its  groves  and  gardens  " 579 

"  The  hackmen  who  shriek  in  your  ear  as  you  arrive 

at  the  depot  " 581 

'  '■  The  '  Crater, '  the  chasm  created  by  the  explosion 
of  the  mine  which  the  Pennsylvanians  sprung 

underneath  Lee's  fortifications  " 582 

"  The  old  cemetery,  and  ruined,  ivy-mantled  Bland- 
ford  Church  " 583 

"  Seen  from  a  distance,    Petersburg  presents  the 
appearance  of  a  lovely  forest  pierced  here  and 

there  by  church  spires  and  towers  " 585 

A  Queer  Cavalier 587 

City  Point,  Virginia 588 

A  Peep  into  the  Great  Dismal  Swamp 589 

A  Glimpse  of  Norfolk,  Virginia 591 

Map  of  the  Virginia  Peninsula 593 

Hampton  Roads 594 

The  Ruins  of  the  old  Church  at  Jamestown,  Vir- 
ginia    621 

Statue  of  Lord  Botetourt  at  Williamsburg,  Vir- 
ginia ." -.-T- 622 

The  old  Colonial  Powder  Magazine  at  Williams- 
burg, Virginia 623 

The  old  Church  of  Bruton  Parish — Williamsburg, 

Virginia 624 

Cornwallis's  Cave,  near  Yorktown,  Virginia  ....  624 
View  of  Richmond,  Virginia,  from  the  Manches- 
ter side  of  the  James  River 626 

Libby  Prison,  Richmond,  Virginia 627 

Capitol  Square,  with  a  view  of  the  Washington 

Monument,  Richmond,  Virginia 628 

St.  John's   Church,  Richmond,  Virginia 629 

View  on  the  James  River,  Richmond,  Virginia. .  630 
Monument  to  the  Confederate  Dead,  Richmond, 

Virginia 631 

The    Gallego    Flouring-Mill,    Richmond,    Vir- 
ginia   631 


Xlll 

PAGE. 

Scene  on  a  Tobacco  Plantation — Burning  a  Plant 

Patch 632 

Tobacco  Culture — Stringing  the  Primings 633 

A  Tobacco  Barn  in  Virginia 633 

The  Old  Method  of  Getting  Tobacco  to  Market.  634 
Getting  a  Tobacco  Hogshead  Ready  for  Market.  635 
Scene  on   a  Tobacco   Plantation — Finding  To- 
bacco Worms : 636 

The  Tredegar  Iron  Works,  Richmond,  Virginia  637 

A  Water-melon  Wagon 646 

A  Marl-bed  on  the  Line  of  the  Chesapeake  and 

Ohio  Railroad 647 

Earthworks  on  the  Chickahominy,  near  Rich- 
mond,  Virginia 648 

Scene  at  a  Virginia  "  Corn-Shed  " 649 

Gordonsville,  Virginia — "The  negroes,  who 
swarm    day  and    night  like    bees   about   the 

trains  " 650 

The  Tomb  of  Thomas  Jefferson,  at  Monticello, 

near  Charlottesville,  Virginia 651 

Monticello — The  Old  Home  of  Thomas  Jefferson, 
author  of  the  Declaration  of  American  Inde- 
pendence    652 

The  University  of  Virginia,  at  Charlottesville. . .  653 

A  Water-melon  Feast 655 

Piedmont,  from  the  Blue  Ridge 656 

View  of  Staunton,  Virginia 657 

Winchester,  Virginia 658 

Buffalo  Gap  and  the  Iron-Furnace 659 

Elizabeth    Iron-Furnace,  Virginia 660 

The  Alum    Spring,  Rockbridge  Alum   Springs, 

Virginia 661 

The   Military  Institute,  Lexington,  Virginia. .. .  661 
Washington   and   Lee  College,  Lexington,  Va.  662 
Portrait  of  General  Thomas  J.  Jackson,  known 
as  "Stonewall  Jackson."  (From  an  engraving 

owned  by  M.  Knoedler  &  Co.,  N.  Y.) 663 

General  Robert  Edward  Lee,  born  January  19, 

1801 ;  died  October  n,  1870 664 

The  Great  Natural  Arch,  Clifton  Forge,  Jack- 
son's River 665 

Beaver  Dam  Falls 665 

Falling  Springs  Falls,  Virginia 666 

Griffith's  Knob,  and  Cow  Pasture  River 667 

Clay  Cut,  Chesapeake  and  Ohio  Railroad 668 

"Mac,  the  Pusher  " 668 

Jerry's  Run 669 

Scene  on  the  Greenbrier  River  in  Western  Vir- 
ginia    670 

The  Hotel  and. Lawn  at  Greenbrier  White  Sul- 
phur Springs,  West  Virginia 671 

The  Eastern   Portal  of  Second  Creek  Tunnel, 

Chesapeake  and  Ohio  Railroad 672 

A  Mountain  Ride  in  a  Stage-Coach 673 

Anvil  Rock,  Greenbrier  River 675 

A  West  Virginia  "  Countryman  " 675 

A  Freighters'  Camp,  West  Virginia 676 

"The  rude  cabin  built  beneath  the  shadow  of  a 

huge  rock  " 677 

"  The  rustic  mill  built  of  logs  " 678 

The  Junction  of  Greenbrier  and  New  Rivers 678 

Descending  the  New  River  Rapids 679 

A  hard  road  for  artists  to  travel 680 

The  "  Hawk's  Nest,"  from  Boulder  Point 681 


XIV 

PAGE. 

Great  Kanawha  Falls 682 

Miller's  Ferry,  seen  from  the  Hawk's  Nest 682 

Richmond  Falls,  New  River 683 

Big  Dowdy  Falls,  near  New  River 684 

Whitcomb's  Bowlder 685 

The  Inclined  Plane  at  Cannelton 686 

Fern  Spring  Branch,  a  West  Virginia  Mountain 

Stream 687 

Charleston,  the  West  Virginia  Capital 688 

The  Hale  House,  Charleston 688 

Rafts  of  Saw-Logs  on  a  West  Virginia  River. . .  689 
The  Snow  Hill   Salt  Works,  on  the  Kanawha 

River 690 

Indian  Mound,  near  St.  Albans 690 

View  of  Huntington  and  the  Ohio  River 691 

The  result  of  climbing  a  sapling — An  Artist  in  a 

Fix 692 

The  Levee  at  Louisville,  Kentucky 693 

A  familiar  scene  in  a  Louisville  Street 695 

A  Waiter  at  the  Gait  House,  Louisville,  Kentucky  696 

Scene  in  the  Louisville  Exposition 697 

Mammoth  Cave,  Kentucky — The  Boat  Ride  on 

Echo  River 699 

The  Entrance  to  Mammoth  Cave  (Looking  Out) .  700 
Mammoth  Cave — In  "the  Devil's  Arm-Chair"..  702 
The  Mammoth  Cave — "The  Fat  Man's  Misery".  703 
Mammoth  Cave — "The  Subterranean  Album".  704 

A  Country  Blacksmith  Shop 706 

The  Court-House,  Louisville 707 

The  Cathedral,  Louisville 708 

The  Post-Office,  Louisville 708 

The  City  Hall,  Louisville 709 

George  D.  Prentice.     (From  a  Painting  in    the 

Louisville  Public  Library) 710 

The  Colored  Normal  School,  Louisville 710 

Louisville,  Kentucky,  on  the  Ohio  River,  from  the 

New  Albany  Heights 7.11 

Chimney  Rock,  Kentucky 712 

Frankfort,  on  the  Kentucky  River 713 

The  Ascent  to  Frankfort  Cemetery,  Kentucky. . .  714 
The  Monument  to  Daniel  Boone  in  the  Cemetery 

at  Frankfort,  Kentucky 715 

View  on  the  Kentucky  River,  near  Frankfort ....  719 

Asteroid  Kicks  Up 717 

A  Souvenir  of  Kentucky 719 

A  little  Adventure  by  the  Wayside 720 

"  Steady  " 725 

The  Tennessee  State  Capitol,  at  Nashville 726 

View  from  the  State  Capitol,  Nashville,  Tennes- 
see   727 

Tomb  of  Ex-President  Polk,  Nashville,  Tennes- 
see   728 

The  Hermitage — General  Andrew  Jackson's  old 

homestead,  near  Nashville,  Tennessee 729 

Young  Tennesseans 730 

The  old  home  of  Gen.  Andrew  Jackson,   near 
Nashville 731 


PAGE. 

Tomb  of  Andrew  Jackson,  at  the  "  Hermitage," 

near  Nashville 732 

View  from  Federal  Hill,  Baltimore,  Maryland, 

looking  across  the  Basin 733 

The  Oldest  House  in  Baltimore 735 

Fort  McHenry,  Baltimore  Harbor 738 

Jones's  Falls,  Baltimore 740 

Exchange  Place,  Baltimore,  Maryland 741 

The  Masonic  Temple,  Baltimore,  Maryland. . . .  742 

The  Shot-Tower,  Baltimore,  Maryland 742 

Scene  on  the  Chesapeake  and  Ohio  Canal 743 

The  Blind  Asylum,  Baltimore,  Maryland 745 

The  Eastern  High  School,  Baltimore,  Maryland  746 
View  of  a  Lake  in  Druid  Hill  Park,  Baltimore. .  747 

Maryland  Institute,  Baltimore 748 

Woodberry,  near  Druid  Hill  Park 749 

The  new  City  Hall,  Baltimore,  Maryland 750 

Lafayette  Square,  Baltimore,  Maryland 750 

.The  City  Jail,  Baltimore,  Maryland 752 

The  Peabody  Institute,  Baltimore,  Maryland...  753 

First  Presbyterian  Church,  Baltimore 754 

A  Tunnel  through  the  Alleghanies 756 

Mount  Vernon  Square,  with  a  view  of  the  Wash- 
ington Monument,  Baltimore,  Maryland 758 

The  Battle  Monument,  seen  from  Barnum's  Ho- 
tel, Baltimore 759 

The  Battle  Monument,  Baltimore,  Maryland  . . .  760 

The  Cathedral,  Baltimore,  Maryland 760 

The  Wildey  Monument,  Baltimore,  Maryland.  761 
Entrance  to  Druid  Hill  Park,  Baltimore,  Mary- 
land   ■. 761 

Scene  on  the  Canal,  near  Harper's  Ferry 762 

The  Bridge  at  Harper's  Ferry 763 

View    of  the    Railroad    and    River,    from    the 

Mountains  at  Harper's  Ferry 764 

Jefferson's  Rock,  Harper's  Ferry 769 

Cumberland  Narrows  and  Mountains 767 

Cumberland  Viaduct,  Maryland 768 

Harper's  Ferry,  Maryland 769 

Old  John  Cupid,  a  Williamsburg  Herb  Doctor.  770 

Southern  Types — Come  to  Market 771 

Southern  Types — A  Southern  Plough  Team ....  772 
Southern  Types — Negro  Boys  Shelling  Peas ....  773 
Southern  Types — A    "likely    Girl"    with    her 

Baby 775 

Southern  Types — Catching  his  Breakfast 776 

Southern  Types — Negro  Shoeblacks 777 

Southern  Types — A  Little  Unpleasantness 779 

Southern  Types — "Going  to  Church" 780 

Southern  Types — A  Negro  Constable 781 

Southern  Types — The  Wolf  and  the  Lamb  in 

Politics 784 

Southern  Types — Two  Veterans  discussing  the 

Political  Situation 787 

The   Potomac  and  Washington,  seen  from  Ar- 
lington     800 

Homeward  Bound 801 


THE  GREAT   SOUTH. 


LOUISIANA     PAST     AND     PRESENT. 


LOUISIANA  to-day  is  Paradise  Lost. 
J  In  twenty  years  it  may  be  Par- 
adise Regained.  It  has  unlimited, 
magnificent  possibilities.  Upon  its 
bayou-penetrated  soil,  on  its  rich 
uplands  and  its  vast  prairies,  a 
gigantic  struggle  is  in  progress. 
It  is  the  battle  of  race  with  race, 
of  the  picturesque  and  unjust  civil- 
ization of  the  past  with  the  prosaic 
and  leveling  civilization  of  the  pres- 
ent. For  a  century  and  a-half  it 
was  coveted  by  all  nations ;  sought 
by  those  great  colonizers  of  Amer- 
ica,— the  French,  the  English,  the 
Spaniards.  It  has  been  in  turn 
the  plaything  of  monarchs  and 
the  bait  of  adventurers.  Its  his- 
tory and  tradition  are  leagued  with 
all  that  was  romantic  in  Europe 
and  on   the  Western    continent  in 

Bienville,  the  Founder  of  New  Orleans.  the    eighteenth     Century.         From    its 

immense  limits  outsprang  the  noble  sisterhood  of  South-western  States,  whose 

inexhaustible  domain   affords  an   ample   refuge  for   the  poor  of  all  the  world. 

A  little  more  than  half  a  century  ago  the  frontier  of  Louisiana,  with  the 

Spanish   internal  provinces,  extended  nineteen  hundred   miles.      The  territory 

2 


18 


LOUISIANA     PAST     AND     PRESENT. 


boasted  a  sea-coast  line  of  five  hundred  miles  on  the  Pacific  Ocean ;  drew  a 
boundary  line  seventeen  hundred  miles  along  the  edge  of  the  British- American 
dominions ;  thence  followed  the  Mississippi  by  a  comparative  course  for  fourteen 
hundred  miles;  fronted  the  Mexican  Gulf  for  seven  hundred  miles,  and  embraced 
within  its  limits  nearly  one  million  five  hundred  thousand  square  miles.  Texas 
was  a  fragment  broken  from  it.  California,  Kansas,  the  Indian  Territory,  Mis- 
souri, and  Mississippi,  were  made  from  it,  and  still  there  was  an  Empire  to 
spare,  watered  by  five  of  the  finest  rivers  of  the  world.  Indiana,  Arkansas, 
Iowa,  Minnesota,  and  Nebraska  were  born  of  it. 

From  French  Bienville  to  American  Claiborne  the  territorial  administrations 
were  dramatic,  diplomatic,  bathed  in  the  atmosphere  of  conspiracy.  Super- 
stition cast  a  weird  veil  of  mystery  over  the  great  rivers,  and  Indian  legend 
peopled  every  nook  and  cranny  of  the  section  with  fantastic  creations  of  untu- 
tored fancy.  The  humble  roof  of  the  log  cabin  on  the  banks  of  the  Mississippi 
covered  all  the  grace  and  elegance  of  French  society  of  Louis  the  Fourteenth's 
time.     Jesuit  and  Cavalier  carried  European  thought  to  the  Indians. 

Frenchman  and  Spaniard,  Canadian  and  Yankee,  intrigued  and  planned  on 
Louisiana  soil  with  an'  energy  and  fierceness  displayed  nowhere  else  in  our 
early  history.  What  wonder,  after  this  cosmopolitan  record,  that  even  the  frag- 
ment of  Louisiana  which  has  retained  the  name — this  remnant  embracing  but 
a  thirtieth  of  the  area  of  the  original  province — yet  still  covering  more  than 
forty  thousand  square  miles  of  prairie,  alluvial,  and  sea  marsh — what  wonder 
that  it  is  so  richly  varied,  so  charming,  so  unique  ? 

Six  o'clock,  on  Saturday  evening,  in  the  good  old  city  of  New  Orleans. 
From  the  tower  of  the  Cathedral  St.  Louis  the  tremulous  harmony  of  bells  drifts 
lightly  on  the  cool  spring  breeze,  and  hovers  like  a  benediction  over  the  antique 
buildings,  the  blossoms  and  hedges  in  the  square,  and  the  broad  and  swiftly- 
flowing  river.  The  bells  are  calling  all  in  the  parish  to  offer  masses  for  the 
repose  of  the  soul  of  the  Cathedral's  founder,  Don  Andre  Almonaster,  once 
upon   a  time  "perpetual  regidor"  of  New   Orleans.     Every  Saturday  eve,  for 

three-quarters  of  a  century,  the 
solemn  music  from  the  Cathedral 
belfry  has  brought  the  good 
Andre  to  mind ;  and  the  mellow 
notes,  as  we  hear  them,  seem  to 
call  up  visions  of  the  quaint  past. 
Don  Andre  gave  the  Cathe- 
dral its  dower  in  1789,  while 
the  colony  was  under  the  domi- 
nation of  Charles  the  Fourth 
of  Spain.  The  original  edifice 
is  gone  now,  and  in  its  stead, 
since  1850,  has  stood  a  com- 
posite structure  which  is  a  monu- 

The  Cathedral  St.  Louis-New  Orleans  ment    tO    bad    taste.        Venerable 


THE     OLD      CATHEDRAL     IN      NEW      ORLEANS. 


19 


"A  blind  beggar  hears  the  rustling  of  her  gown,  and   stretches 
out  his  trembling  hand  for  alms." 


and  imposing  was  the  old  Cathedral,  with  its  melange  of  rustic,  Tuscan,  and 
Roman  Doric  styles  of  architecture;  with  its  towers  crowned  with  low  spires, 
and  its  semicircular  arched  door,  with  clustered  columns  on  either  side  at  the 
front;  and  many  a  grand  pageant  had  it  seen. 

Under  the  pavement  of  the  Cathedral 
lies  buried  Father  Antonio  de  Sedella, 
a  Spanish  priest,  who,  in  his  time,  was 
one  of  the  celebrities  of  New  Orleans, 
and  the  very  recollection  of  whom  calls 
up  memories  of  the  Inquisition,  of 
intrigue  and  mystery.  Father  Antonio's 
name  is  sacred  in  the  Louisiana  capital, 
nevertheless;  for  although  an  enraged 
Spanish  Governor  once  expelled  him 
for  presuming  to  establish  the  Inquisition 
in  the  colony,  he  came  back,  and  flour- 
ished until  1837,  under  American  rule, 
dying  at  the  age  of  ninety,  in  the  odor 
of  sanctity,  mourned  by  the  women  and 
worshiped  by  the  children. 

Now  the  sunlight  mingles  with  the 
breeze  bewitchingly ;  the  old  square, 
the  gray  and  red  buildings  with  massive  walls  and  encircling  balconies,  the  great 
door  of  the  new  Cathedral,  all  are  lighted  up.  See  !  a  black-robed  woman,  with 
downcast  eyes,  passes  silently  over  the  holy  threshold ;  a  blind  beggar,  with 
a  parti-colored  handkerchief  wound  about  his  weather-beaten  head,  hears  the 
rustling  of  her  gown,  and  stretches  out  his 
trembling  hand  for  alms ;  a  black  girl 
looks  wonderingly  into  the  holy-water 
font;  the  market-women  hush  their  chatter 
as  they  near  the  portal;  a  mulatto  fruit- 
seller  is  lounging  in  the  shade  of  an 
ancient  arch,  beneath  the  old  Spanish 
Council  House.  This  is  not  an  American 
scene,  and  one  almost  persuades  himself 
that  he  is  in  Europe,  although  ten  min- 
utes of  rapid  walking  will  bring  him  to 
streets  and  squares  as  generically  American 
as  any  in  Boston,  Chicago,  or  St.  Louis. 
The  city  of  New  Orleans  is  fruitful  in 
surprises.  In  a  morning's  promenade, 
which  shall  not  extend  over  an  hundred 
acres,  one  may  encounter  the  civilizations 
of  Paris,    of  Madrid,    of   Messina;     may 

Stumble     Upon     the     Semi-barbaric     life     Of   "A  black  girl  looks  wonderingly  into  the  holy-water  font' 


20 


NAPOLEON      THE      GREAT     AND     LOUISIANA. 


the  negro  and  the  native  Indian;  may  see  the  overworked  American  in  his 
business  establishment  and  in  his  elegant  home;  and  may  find,  strangest  of  all, 
that  each  and  every  foreign  type  moves  in  a  special  current  of  its  own,  mingling 
little  with  the  American,  which  is  dominant:  in  it,  yet  not  of  it — as  the  Gulf 
Stream  in  the  ocean. 

But  the  older  colonial  landmarks  in  the  city,  as  throughout  the  State  and 
the  Mississippi  Valley,  are  fast  disappearing.  The  imprint  of  French  manners 
and  customs  will  long  remain,  however ;  for  it  was  produced  by  two  periods 
of  domination.  The  hatred  of  Napoleon  the  Great  for  the  English  was 
the  motive  which  led  to  the  cession  of  Louisiana  to  the  United  States:  had  he 
not  come  upon  the  stage  of  European  politics,  the  Valley  of  the  Father  of 
Waters  might  have  been  French  to-day ;  and  both  sides  of  Canal  street  would 
have  reminded  the  European  of  Paris  and  Bordeaux. 

The  French  Emperor,  fearful  lest  the  cannon  of  the  English  fleets  might 
thunder  at  the  gates  of  New  Orleans  when  he  was  at  war  with  England,  at  the 
beginning  of  this  century,  sold  the  "  Earthly  Paradise  "  to  the  United  States. 
"  The  English,"  said  the  man  of  destiny,  "  shall  not  have  the  Mississippi,  which 
they  covet."  And  they  did  not  get  it.  Seventy  years  ago  the  tide  of  crude, 
hasty  American  progress  rushed  in  upon  the  lovely  lowlands  bordering  the  river 
and  the  Gulf;  and  it  is  astonishing  that  even  a  few  landmarks  of  French  and 
Spanish  rule  are  left  high  above  the  flood. 

Yonder  is   the    archbishop's    palace: 

enter  the  street  at  one  side  of  it,  and  you 

seem  in  a  foreign  land;   in  the  avenue  at 

the    other  you    catch   a   glimpse  of  the 

rush  and  hurry  of  American  traffic  of 

to-day   along    the    levee ;    you    see    the 

sharp-featured    "  river-hand, "    hear    his 

uncouth  parlance,  and  recognize  him  for 

your  countryman;  you  see  huge  piles  of 

cotton  bales;  you  hear  the  monotonous 

The  Archbishop's  Paiace-New  Orleans.  whistle  of  the  gigantic  white    steamers 

arriving  and  departing;  and  the  irrepressible  negro  slouches  sullenly  by  with  his 

hands  in  his  pockets,  and  his  cheeks  distended  with  tobacco. 

You  must  know  much  of  the  past  of  New  Orleans  and  Louisiana  to  thor- 
oughly understand  their  present.  New  England  sprang  from  the  Puritan  mould; 
Louisiana  from  the  French  and  Spanish  civilizations  of  the  eighteenth  century. 
The  one  stands  erect,  vibrating  with  life  and  activity,  austere  and  ambitious, 
upon  its  rocky  shores ;  the  other  lies  prone,  its  rich  vitality  dormant  and  passive, 
luxurious  and  unambitious,  on  the  glorious  shores  of  the  tropic  Gulf.  The 
former  was  Anglo-Saxon  and  simple  even  to  Spartan  plainness  at  its  outset ;  the 
latter  was  Franco- Spanish,  subtle  in  the  graces  of  the  elder  societies,  self- 
indulgent  and  romantic  at  its  beginning.  And  New  Orleans  was  no  more  and  no 
less  the  opposite  of  Boston  in  1773  than  a  century  later.  It  was  a  hardy  rose 
which  dared  to  blush,  in  the  New  England  even  of  Governor  Winthrop's  time, 


BIENVILLE     AND      HIS      COLONY.  21 

beiore  June  had  dowered  the  land  with  beauty ;  it  was  an  o  'er  modest  Choctaw 
rose  in  the  Louisiana  of  De  Soto's  epoch  which  did  not  shower  its  petals  on  the 
fragrant  turf  in  February. 

*  In  Louisiana  summer  lingers  long  after  the  rude  winter  of  the  North  has  done 
its  work  of  devastation;  the  sleeping  passion  of  the  climate  only  wakes  now 
and  then  into  the  anger  of  lightning  or  the  terrible  tears  of  the  thunder-storm; 
there  are  no  chronic  March  horrors  of  deadly  wind  or  transpiercing  cold ;  the 
sun  is  kind ;   the  days  are  radiant. 

Wandering  from  the  -  ancient  Place  d' Armes,  now  dignified  with  the  appel- 
lation of  "  Jackson  Square,"  through  the  older  quarters  of  the  city,  one  may 
readily  recall  the  curious,  changeful  past  of  the  commonwealth  and  its  cos- 
mopolitan capital ;  for  there  is  a  visible  reminder  at  many  a  corner  and  on 
many  a  wall.  It  requires  but  little  effort  of  imagination  to  restore  the  city  to  our 
view  as  it  was  in  1723,  five  years  after  Bienville,  the  second  French  Governor  of 
Louisiana,  had  undertaken  the  dubious  project  of  establishing  a  capital  on  the 
treacherous  Mississippi's  bank. 

Discouraged  and  faint  almost  unto  death,  after  the  terrible  sufferings  which 
he  and  his  fellow- colonists  had  undergone  at  Biloxi,  a  bleak  fort  in  a  wilderness, 
he  had  dragged  his  weary  limbs  to  the  place  on  the  river  where  New  Orleans 
stands  to-day,  and  there  defiantly  unfurled  the  flag  of  France,  and  made 
his  last  stand  !  Bienville  was  a  man  of  vast  courage  and  supreme  daring ; 
he  had  been  drifting  along  the  Mississippi,  through  the  stretches  of  wilderness, 
since  1699;  had  vanquished  Indian  and  beast  of  the  forest;  was  skilled  in  the 
lore  of  the  backwoodsman,  as  became  hardy  son  of  hardier  Canadian  father. 

When  he  succeeded  the  alert  and  courageous  Sauvolle  as  Governor  of  the 
colony,  which  had  then  become  indisputably  French,  he  entered  upon  a  period 
of  harrowing  and  petty  vexations.  He  had  to  keep  faithful  and  persistent  watch 
at  the  entrance  of  the  river  from  the  Gulf,  for,  during  many  years  England, 
France,  and  Spain  were  at  war,  and  the  Spaniards  ever  kept  a  jealous  eye  on 
French  progress  in  America.  The  colony  languished,  and  was  inhabited  by 
only  a  few  vagabond  Canadians,  some  dubious  characters  from  France,  and  the 
Government  officers.  On  the  14th  of  September,  17 12,  Louis  the  Magnificent 
granted  to  Anthony  Crozat,  a  merchant  prince,  the  Rothschild  of  the  day,  the 
exclusive  privilege,  for  fifteen  years,  of  trading  in  all  the  indefinitely  bounded 
territory  claimed  by  France  as  Louisiana. 

Crozat  obtained  with  his  charter  the  additional  privilege  of  sending  a  ship 
once  a  year  for  negroes  to  Africa,  and  of  owning  and  working  all  the  mines  that 
might  be  discovered  in  the  colony,  provided  that  one-fourth  of  their  proceeds 
should  be  reserved  for  the  king.  One  ship-load  of  slaves  to  every  two  ship-loads 
of  independent  colonists  was  the  proportion  established  for  emigration  to 
Louisiana  more  than  a  century  and  a  half  ago.      Slavery  was  well  begun. 

In  171 3  Bienville  was  displaced  to  make  room  for  Cadillac,  sent  from  France 
as  Governor ;  a  rude,  quarrelsome  man,  who  saw  no  good  in  the  new  colony, 
and  hated  and  feared  Bienville.  But  Cadillac's  daughter  loved  the  quondam 
Governor  whom  her  father's  arrival  had  degraded  ;'and  to  save  her  from  a  wasted 


22  LOUISIANA      AND     JOHN      LAW: 

life,  the  proud  Cadillac  offered  her  in  marriage  to  Bienville.  The  latter  did  not 
reciprocate  the  maid's  affection,  and  Cadillac,  burning  with  rage,  and  anxious  to 
avenge  himself  for  this  humiliation,  sent  Bienville  with  a  small  force  on  a 
dangerous  expedition  among  the  hostile  Indians.  He  went,  returning  success- 
ful and  unharmed.  Cadillac's  temper  soon  caused  his  own  downfall,  and  others, 
equally  unsuccessful,  succeeded  him.  Crozat's  schemes  failed,  and  he  relin- 
quished the  colony. 

And  then  ?  Louisiana  the  indefinite  and  unfortunate  fell  into  the  clutches  of 
John  Law.  The  regent  Duke  of  Orleans  had  decided  to  "foster  and  preserve 
the  colony,"  and  in  1717  gave  it  to  the  "Company  of  the  Indies,"  a  com- 
mercial oligarchy  into  which  Law  had  blown  the  breath  of  life.  The  Royal. 
Bank  sprang  into  existence  under  Law's  enchanted  wand ;  the  charter  of  the 
Mississippi  Company  was  registered  at  Paris,  and  the  exclusive  privilege  of 
trading  with  Louisiana,  during  twenty-five  years,  was  granted  to  that  company. 

France  was  flooded  with  rumors  that  Louisiana  was  the  long-sought  Eldo- 
rado; dupes  were  made  by  millions;  princes  waited  in  John  Law's  ante-rooms 
in  Paris.  Then  came  the  revulsion,  the  overturn  of  Law.  Louisiana  was  no 
longer  represented  as  the  new  Atlantis,  but  as  the  very  mouth  of  the  pit;  and 
it  was  colonized  only  by  thieves,  murderers,  beggars,  and  gypsies,  gathered  up 
by  force  throughout  France  and  expelled  from  the  kingdom. 

After  the  bursting  of  the  Law  bubble,  Bienville  was  once  more  appointed 
Governor  of  Louisiana,  and  his  favorite  town  was  selected  as  the  capital  of  the 
territory.  The  seat  of  government  was  removed  from  New  Biloxi  to  New 
Orleans,  as  the  city  was  called  in  honor  of  the  title  of  the  regent  of  France. 

Let  us  look  at  the  New  Orleans  of  the  period  between  1723  and  1730. 
Imagine  a  low-lying  swamp,  overgrown  with  a  dense  ragged  forest,  cut  up  into  a 
thousand  miniature  islands  by  ruts  and  pools  filled  with  stagnant  water.  Fancy 
a  small  cleared  space  along  the  superb  river  channel,  a  space  often  inundated,  but 
partially  reclaimed  from  the  circumambient  swamp,  and  divided  into  a  host  of 
small  correct  squares,  each  exactly  like  its  neighbor,  and  so  ditched  within  and 
without  as  to  render  wandering  after  nightfall  perilous. 

The  ditch  which  ran  along  the  four  sides  of  every  square  in  the  city  was  filled 
with  a  composite  of  black  mud  and  refuse,  which,  under  a  burning  sun,  sent 
forth  a  deadly  odor.  Around  the  city  was  a  palisade  and  a  gigantic  moat ;  tall 
grasses  grew  up  to  the  doors  of  the  houses,  and  the  hoarse  chant  of  myriads 
of  frogs  mingled  with  the  vesper  songs  of  the  colonists.  Away  where  the  waters 
of  the  Mississippi  and  of  Lake  Pontchartrain  had  formed  a  high  ridge  of  land,  was 
the  "  Leper's  Bluff;  "  and  among  the  reeds  from  the  city  thitherward  always 
lurked  a  host  of  criminals. 

The  negro,  fresh  from  the  African  coast,  then  strode  defiantly  along  the 
low  shores  by  the  stream ;  he  had  not  learned  the  crouching,  abject  gait  which 
a  century  of  slavery  afterwards  gave  him.  He  was  punished  if  he  rebelled; 
but  he  kept  his  dignity.  In  the  humble  dwellings  which  occupied  the  squares 
there  were  noble  manners  and  graces;  all  the  traditions  and  each  finesse  of  the 
time  had  not  been  forgotten  in  the  voyage  from  France :    and  airy  gentlemen 


NEW     ORLEANS      FROM      1723      TO      1730.  23 

and  stately  dames  promenaded  in  this  queer,    swamp-surrounded,   river-endan- 
gered fortress,  with  Parisian  grace  and  ease. 

There  were  few  churches,  and  the  colonists  gathered  about  great  wooden 
crosses  in  the  open  air  for  the  ceremonials  of  their  religion  There  were  twice  as 
many  negroes  as  white  people  in  the  city.  Domestic  animals  were  so  scarce  that 
he  who  injured  or  fatally  wounded  a  horse  or  a  cow  was  punished  with  death. 
Ursuline  nuns  and  Jesuit  fathers  glided  about  the  streets  upon  their  sacred 
missions.  The  principal  avenues  within  the  fortified  enclosure  were  named  after 
princes  of  the  royal  blood — Maine,  Conde,  Conti,  Toulouse,  and  Bourbon; 
Chartres  street  took  its  name  from  that  of  the  son  of  the  regent  of  Orleans,  and 
an  avenue  was  named  in  honor  of  Governor  Bienville. 

Along  the  river,  for  many  miles  beyond  the  city,  marquises  and  other  noble 
representatives  of  aristocratic  French  families  had  established  plantations,  and 
lived  luxurious  lives  of  self-indulgence,  without  especially  contributing  to  the 
wealth  of  the  colony.  Jews  were  banished  from  the  bounds  of  Louisiana.  Sun- 
days and  holidays  were  strictly  observed,  and  negroes  found  working  on  Sunday 
were  confiscated.  No  worship  save  the  Catholic  was  allowed ;  white  subjects 
were  forbidden  to  marry  or  to  live  in  concubinage  with  slaves,  and  masters  were 
not  allowed  to  force  their  slaves  into  any  marriage  against  their  will;  the  children 
of  a  negro  slave-husband  and  a  negro  free-wife  were  all  free ;  if  the  mother  was 
a  slave  and  the  husband  was  free,  the  children  shared  the  condition  of  the 
mother. 

Slaves  were  forbidden  to  gather  in  crowds,  by  day  or  night,  under  any 
pretext,  and  if  found  assembled,  were  punished  by  the  whip,  or  branded  with 
the  mark  of  the  flower-de-luce,  or  executed.  The  slaves  all  wore  marks  or 
badges,  and  were  not  permitted  to  sell  produce  of  any  kind  without  the  written 
consent  of  their  masters.  The  protection  and  security  of  slaves  in  old  age  was 
well  provided  for;  Christian  negroes  were  permitted  burial  in  consecrated  ground. 
The  slave  who  produced  a  bruise,  or  the  "  shedding  of  blood  in  the  face,"  on  the 
person  of  his  master,  or  any  of  the  family  to  which  he  appertained,  by  striking 
them,  was  condemned  to  death ;  and  the  runaway  slave,  when  caught,  after  the 
first  offence,  had  his  ears  cut  off,  and  was  branded ;  after  the  second,  was  ham- 
strung and  again  branded ;  after  the  third,  was  condemned  to  death.  Slaves 
who  had  been  set  free  were  still  bound  to  show  the  profoundest  respect  to  their 
"former  masters,  their  widows  and  children,"  under  pain  of  severe  penalties. 
Slave  husbands  and  wives  were  not  permitted  to  be  seized  and  sold  separately 
when  belonging  to  the  same  master;  and  whenever  slaves  were  appointed 
tutors  to  their  masters'  children,  they  "  were  held  and  regarded  as  being  thereby 
set  free  to  all  intents  and  purposes." 

The  Choctaws  and  Chickasaws,  neighbors  to  the  colonists,  were  waging 
destructive  war  against  each  other;  hurricanes  regularly  destroyed  all  the 
engineering  works  erected  by  the  French  Government  at  the  mouths  of  the 
Mississippi ;  and  expeditions  against  the  Natchez  and  the  Chickasaws,  arrivals 
of  ships  from  France  with  loads  of  troops,  provisions,  and  wives  for  the  col- 
onists,  the  building  of  levees  along  the  river  front  near  New  Orleans,  and  the 


24  MEMORIALS      OF      FRENCH      DOMINATION. 

occasional  deposition  from  and  re-instatement  in  office  of  Bienville,  were  the  chief 
events  in  those  crude  days  of  the  beginning. 

I  like  to  stand  in  these  old  Louisiana  by-ways,  and  contemplate  the 
progress  of  French  civilization  in  them,  now  that  it  has  been  displaced  by  a 
newer  one.  I  like  to  remember  that  New  Orleans  was  named  after  the  regent  of 
France ;  that  the  beautiful  lake  lying  between  the  city  and  the  Gulf  was 
christened  after  the  splendid  Pontchartrain,  him  of  the  lean  and  hungry  look,  and 
of  the  "  smile  of  death,"  him  to  whom  the  heart  of  Louis  the  Fourteenth  was 
always  open ;  and  that  the  other  lake,  near  the  city,  was  named  in  memory  of 
Maurepas,  the  wily  adviser  of  Louis  the  Sixteenth  and  unlucky. 

I  like  to  remember  that  Louisiana  itself  owes  its  pretentious  name  to  the 
devotion  of  its  discoverer  to  the  great  monarch  whom  the  joyous  La  Salle 
could  not  refrain  from  calling  "  the  most  puissant,  most  high,  most  invincible  and 
victorious  prince."  I  like  to  picture  to  myself  Allouez  and  Father  Dablon, 
Marquette  and  Joliet,  La  Salle,  Iberville,  and  Bienville,  following  in  the  footsteps 
of  Garay  and  Leon,  Cordova  and  Narvaez,  De  Vaca  and  Friar  Mark ;  and  finally 
tracing  and  identifying  the  current  of  the  wild,  mysterious  Mississippi,  which  had 
been  but  a  tradition  for  ages,  until  every  nook  and  cranny,  from  the  Falls  of  St. 
Anthony  to  the  Gulf  of  Mexico,  re-echoed  to  French  words  of  command  and 
prayer,  as  well  as  to  gayest  of  French  chansons. 

Let  us  take  another  picture  of  New  Orleans,  from  1792  to  1797,  thirty  years 
after  the  King  of  France  had  bestowed  upon  "  his  cousin  of  Spain"  the  splendid 
gift  of  Louisiana,  ceding  it,  "without  any  exception  or  reservation  whatever, 
from  the  pure  impulse  of  his  generous  heart."  That  a  country  should,  by  a 
simple  stroke  of  the  pen,  strip  herself  of  possessions  extending  from  the  mouth  of 
the  Mississippi  to  the  St.  Lawrence,  is  almost  incomprehensible. 

France  had  perhaps  already  learned  that  her  people  had  not  in  their  breasts 
that  eternal  hunger  for  travel,  that  feverish  unrest,  which  has  made  the  Anglo- 
Saxon  the  most  successful  of  colonists,  and  has  given  half  the  world  to  him  and 
to  his  descendants.  But  the  French  had  nobly  done  the  work  of  pioneering. 
Sauvolle,  grimly  defying  death  at  Biloxi ;  Bienville,  urging  the  adventurous  prow 
of  his  ship  through  the  reeds  at  the  Mississippi's  mouth,  are  among  the  most 
heroic  figures  in  the  early  history  of  the  country. 

New  Orleans  from  1 792  to  1 797  ?  Its  civilization  has  changed ;  it  is  fitted 
into  the  iron  groove  of  Spanish  domination,  and  has  become  bigoted,  narrow, 
and  hostile  to  innovation.  Along  the  streets,  now  lined  with  low,  flat- roofed, 
balconied  houses,  out  of  whose  walls  peep  little  hints  of  Moorish  architec- 
ture, stalks  the  lean  and  haughty  Spanish  cavalier,  with  his  hand  upon  his 
sword ;  and  the  quavering  voice  of  the  night  watchman,  equipped  with  his 
traditional  spear  and  lantern,  is  heard  through  the  night  hours  proclaiming  that 
all  is  "  serene,"  although  at  each  corner  lurks  a  fugitive  from  justice,  waiting 
only  until  the  watchman  has  passed  to  commit  new  crime.  Six  thousand  souls 
now  inhabit  the  city ,  there  are  hints  in  the  air  of  a  plague,  and  the  Intendant 
has  written  home  to  the  Council  of  State  that  "  some  affirm  that  the  yellow  fever 
is  to  be  feared." 


NEW      ORLEANS      UNDER      SPANISH      RULE.  2$ 

The  priests  and  friars  are  half-mad  with  despair  because  the  mixed  popula- 
tion pays  so  very  little  attention  to  its  salvation  from  eternal  damnation,  and 
because  the  roystering  officers  and  soldiers  of  the  regiment  of  Louisiana  admit 
that  they  have  not  been  to  mass  for  three  years.  The  French  hover  about 
the  few  taverns  and  coffee-houses  permitted  in  the  city,  and  mutter  rebellion 
against  the  Spaniard,  whom  they  have  always  disliked.  The  Spanish  and 
French  schools  are  in  perpetual  collision ;  so  are  the  manners,  customs,  diets, 
and  languages  of  the  respective  nations.  The  Ursuline  convent  has  refused  to 
admit  Spanish  women  who  desire  to  become  nuns,  unless  they  learn  the 
French  language ;  and  the  ruling  Governor,  Baron  Carondelet,  has  such  small 
faith  in  the  loyalty  of  the  colonists  that  he  has  had  the  fortifications  con- 
structed with  a  view  not  only  to  protecting  himself  against  attacks  from  without, 
but  from  within. 

The  city  has  suddenly  taken  on  a  wonderful  aspect  of  barrack-yard  and  camp. 
On  the  side  fronting  the  Mississippi  are  two  small  forts  commanding  the  road  and 
the  river.  On  their  strong  and  solid  brick-coated  parapets,  Spanish  sentinels 
are  languidly  pacing ;  and  cannon  look  out  ominously  over  the  walls.  Between 
these  two  forts,  and  so  arranged  as  to  cross  its  fires  with  them,  fronting  on  the 
main  street  of  the  town,  is  a  great  battery  commanding  the  river.  Then  there 
are  forts  at  each  of  the  salient  angles  of  the  long  square  forming  the  city,  and  a 
third  a  little  beyond  them — all  armed  with  eight  guns  each.  From  one  of  these 
tiny  forts  to  another,  noisy  dragoons  are  always  clattering;  officers  are  parading 
to  and  fro ;  government  officials  block  the  way ;  and  the  whole  town  looks  like  a 
Spanish  garrison  gradually  growing,  by 


some  mysterious  process  of  transforma- 
tion, into  a  French  city. 

Yet  the  Spanish  civilization  does  not 
and  can  not  take  a  strong  hold  there. 
Spain  does  not  give  to  New  Orleans 
so  many  lasting  historic  souvenirs  as 
France.  Barracks,  petty  forts,  dragoon 
stables,  and  many  other  quaint  build- 
ings finally  disappear,  leaving  only  the 
"Principal,"  next  the  Cathedral,  its 
fellow  on  the  other  side  of  the  old 
church,  some  aged  private  dwellings,  ?  ^*  -^-^s 
rapidly  decaying,  and  a  delicate  imprint  "Sorae  ased  prfvate  dwellings,  rapidly  decaying." 

and  suggestion  of  former  Spanish  rule  scattered  throughout  various  quarters 
of  the  city.  But  Spanish  society  still  lingers,  and  in  some  parts  of  the  old 
town  the  many-balconied,  thick-walled  houses  for  the  moment  mislead  the 
visitor  into  the  belief  that  he  is  in  Spain  until  he  hears  the  French  language, 
or  the   curious   Creole  patois  everywhere  about  him. 

Let  us  take  another  look  at  the  past  of  New  Orleans.  The  Spaniard  has 
gone  his  ways ;  Ulloa  and  O'Reilly,  Unzaga,  Galvez,  and  Miro,  have  held  their 
governorships  under  the  Spanish  King.     Carondelet,   Gayoso,  Casa-Calvo,  and 


26 


EXIT     SPANIARD ENTER     AMERICAN. 


A  brace  of  old  Spanish  Governors.  — From  portraits  owned 
by  Hon.  Charles  Gayarre,  of  New  Orleans. 


Salcedo  alike   have  vanished.     There   have  been  insurrections   on   the   part   of 
the  French  ;   many  longings  after  the  old  banner ;    and  at  last  the  government 

of  France  determines  once  more  to  pos- 
sess the  grand  territory.  Spain  well 
knows  that  it  is  useless  to  oppose  this 
decision ;  is  not  sorry,  withal,  to  be  rid 
of  a  colony  so  difficult  to  govern,  and 
so  near  to  the  quarrelsome  Americans, 
who  have  many  times  threatened  to 
take  New  Orleans  by  force  if  any  far- 
ther commercial  regulations  are  made 
by  Spaniards  at  the  Mississippi's  outlet. 
Napoleon  the  Great  has  three  things 
to  gain  by  the  possession  of  the  Ter- 
ritory :  the  command  of  the  Gulf;  the 
supply  of  the  islands  owned  by  France  ;  and  a  place  of  settlement  for  sur- 
plus population.  So  that,  at  St.  Ildefonso,  on  the  morning  of  October  first, 
1800,  a  treaty  of  cession  is  signed  by  Spain,  its  third  article  reading  as  fol- 
lows :  "  His  Catholic  Majesty  promises  and  engages,  on  his  part,  to  retrocede 
to  the  French  Republic,  six  months  after  the  full  and  entire  execution  of  the 
conditions  and  stipulations  herein  relative  to  His  Royal  Highness  the  Duke 
of  Parma — the  colony  or  province  of  Louisiana,  with  the  same  extent  that  it  now 
has  in  the  hands  of  Spain,  and  that  it  had  when  France  possessed  it ;  and  such  as 
it  should  be  after  the  treaties  subsequently  entered  into  between  Spain  and  other 
states." 

This  treaty  is  kept  secret  while  the  French  fit  out  an  expedition  to  sail  and 
take  sudden  possession  of  the  reacquired  Territory;  but  the  United  States  has 
sharp  ears ;  and  Minister  Livingston  besets  the  cabinet  of  the  First  Consul 
at  Paris ;  fights  a  good  battle  of  diplomacy ;  is  dignified  as  well  as  aggressive ; 
wins  his  cause;  and  Napoleon  tells  his  counselors,  on  Easter  Sunday,  1803,  his 
resolve  in  the  following  words :  "  I  know  the  full  value  of  Louisiana,  and  I  have 
been  desirous  of  repairing  the  fault  of  the  French  negotiator  who  abandoned  it 
in  1763  ;  a  few  lines  of  a  treaty  have  restored  it  to  me,  and  I  have  scarcely 
recovered  it  when  I  must  expect  to  lose  it.  But  if  it  escapes  from  me,  it  shall 
one  day  cost  dearer  to  those  who  oblige  me  to  strip  myself  of  it  than  to  those  to 
whom  I  wish  to  deliver  it."  And  it  is  forthwith  ceded  to  the  United  States,  in 
1803,  on  the  "tenth  day  of  Floreal,  in  the  eleventh  year  of  the  French  republic," 
in  consideration  of  the  payment  by  our  government  of  sixty  millions  of  francs. 

Half  a  generation  brings  the  conflicting  national  elements  into  something  like 
harmony,  and  makes  Louisiana  a  territory  containing  fifty  thousand  souls.  The 
first  steamboat  ploughs  through  the  waters  of  the  Mississippi,  but  more  stirring 
events  also  take  place.  In  18 12  Congress  declares  that  war  exists  between 
Great  Britain  and  the  United  States,  and  early  in  1 8 1 5  General  Andrew  Jackson 
wins  a  decisive  victory  over  the  English  arms,  on  the  lowlands  near  New 
Orleans.      Fifteen  thousand  skilled  British  soldiers  are  beaten  off  and  sent  home 


GENERAL     JACKSON'S     TRIUMPH. 


27 


in  disorder  by  the  raw  troops  of  the  river  States,  by  the  stalwart  Kentuckians, 
the  hunters  of  Tennessee,  the  rough,  hard-handed  sons  of  Illinois,  the  dashing 
horsemen  of  Mississippi,  and  the  handsome  and  athletic  Creoles  of  Louisiana. 
When  the  victorious  Americans  return  to  New  Orleans,  a  grand  parade  is 
held  in  the  square  henceforth  to  commemorate  the  name  of  Jackson,  and  where 


«wstw>;sMiov-0  : 


"And  where  to-day  stands  a  fine  Equestrian  Statue  of  the  great  General." 

to-day  stands  a  fine  equestrian  statue  of  the  great  general.  In  front  of  old 
Almonaster's  cathedral  the  troops  are  drawn  up  in  order  of  review.  Under  a 
triumphal  arch,  from  which  glittering  lines  of  bayonets  stretch  to  the  river, 
General  Jackson,  the  hero  of  the  Chalmette  battle-field,  passes,  and  bows  low 
his  laurel-crowned  head  to  receive  the  apostolic  benediction  of  the  venerable 
Abbe. 


II. 

THE   FRENCH   QUARTER  OF  NEW  ORLEANS — THE 
REVOLUTION  AND  ITS  EFFECTS. 

LET  me  show  you  some  pictures  from  the  New  Orleans  of  to-day.  The  night- 
mare of  civil  war  has  passed  away,  leaving  the  memory  of  visions  which 
it  is  not  my  province— *- certainly  not  my  wish — to  renew.  The  Crescent 
City  has  grown  so  that  Claiborne  and  Jackson  could  no  longer  recognize  it. 
It  was  gaining  immensely  in  wealth  and  population  until  the  social  and 
political  revolutions  following  the  war  came  with  their  terrible,  crushing  weight, 
and  the  work  of  re-establishing  the  commerce  of  the  State  has  gone  on  under 
conditions  most  disheartening  and  depressing;  though  trial  seems  to  have 
brought  out  a  reserve  of  energy  of  which  its  possessors  had  never  suspected 
themselves  capable. 

Step  off  from  Canal  street,  that  avenue  of  compromises  which  separates  the 
French  and  the  American  quarters,  some  bright  February  morning,  and  you 
will  at  once  find  yourself  in  a  foreign  atmosphere.  A  walk  into  the  French 
section  enchants  you ;  the  characteristics  of  an  American  city  vanish ;  this  might 
be  Toulouse,  or  Bordeaux,  or  Marseilles !  The  houses  are  all  of  stone  or  brick, 
stuccoed  or  painted;  the  windows  of  each  story  descend  to  the  floors,  opening, 
like  doors,  upon  airy,  pretty  balconies,  protected  by  iron  railings;  quaint 
dormer  windows  peer  from  the  great  roofs;  the  street  doors  are  massive,  and 
large  enough  to  admit  carriages  into  the  stone-paved  court-yards,  from  which 
stairways  communicate  with  the  upper  apartments. 

Sometimes,  through  a  portal  opened  by  a  slender,  dark-haired,  bright-eyed 
Creole  girl  in  black,  you  catch  a  glimpse  of  a  garden,  delicious  with  daintiest 
blossoms,  purple  and  red  and  white  gleaming  from  vines  clambering  along  a  gray 
wall ;  rose-bushes,  with  the  grass  about  them  strewn  with  petals ;  bosquets, 
green  and  symmetrical ;  luxuriant  hedges,  arbors,  and  refuges,  trimmed  by 
skillful  hands;  banks  of  verbenas;  bewitching  profusion  of  peach  and  apple 
blossoms ;  the  dark  green  of  the  magnolia ;  in  a  quiet  corner,  the  rich  glow  of 
the  orange  in  its  nest  among  the  thick  leaves  of  its  parent  tree ;  the  palmetto, 
the  catalpa; — a  mass  of  bloom  which  laps  the  senses  in  slumbrous  delight. 
Suddenly  the  door  closes,  and  your  paradise  is  lost,  while  Eve  remains  inside 
the  gate  ! 

From  the  balconies  hang,  idly  flapping  in  the  breeze,  little  painted  tin 
placards,  announcing  "  Furnished  apartments  to  rent !"  Alas !  in  too  many  of 
the  old  mansions  you  are  ushered  by  a  gray-faced  woman  clad  in  deepest 
black,  with  little  children  clinging  jealously  to  her  skirts,  and  you  instinctively 


PROMENADES     IN     THE     FRENCH     QUARTER.  20, 

note  by  her  manners  and  her  speech  that  she  did  not  rent  rooms  before  the 
war.  You  pity  her,  and  think  of  the  multitudes  of  these  gray-faced  women; 
of  the  numbers  of  these  silent,  almost  desolate  houses. 

Now  and  then,  too,  a  knock  at  the  porter's  lodge  will  bring  to  your  view  a 
bustling  Creole  dame,  fat  and  fifty,  redolent  of  garlic  and  new  wine,  and  robust 
in  voice  as  in  person.  How  cheerily  she  retails  her  misfortunes,  as  if  they  were 
blessings!  "An  invalid  husband — voyez-vous  fa!  Auguste  a  Confederate, 
of  course — and  is  yet;  but  the  pauvre  garfon  is  unable  to  work,  and  we  are  very 
poor !"  All  this  merrily,  and  in  high  key,  while  the  young  negress — the 
housemaid — stands  lazily  listening  to  her  mistress's  French,  nervously  polishing 
with  her  huge  lips  the  handle  of  the  broom  she  holds  in  her  broad,  corded 
hands. 

Business  here,  as  in  foreign  cities,  has  usurped  only  half  the  domain ;  the 
shopkeepers  live  over  their  shops,  and  communicate  to  their  commerce  somewhat 
of  the  aroma  of  home.  The  dainty  salon,  where  the  ladies'  hairdresser  holds 
sway,  has  its  doorway  enlivened  by  the  baby;  the  grocer  and  his  wife,  the 
milliner  and  his  daughter,  are  behind  the  counters  in  their  respective  shops. 
Here  you  pass  a  little  cafe,  with  the  awning  drawn  down,  and,  peering  in, 
can  distinguish  half-a-dozen  bald,  rotund  old  boys  drinking  their  evening 
absinthe,  and  playing  picquet  and  vingt-et-un,  exactly  as  in  France. 

Here,  perhaps,  is  a  touch  of  Americanism :  a 
lazy  negro,  recumbent  in  a  cart,  with  his  eyes 
languidly  closed,  and  one  dirty  foot  sprawled  on  the 
sidewalk.  No  !  even  he  responds  to  your  question  in 
French,  which  he  speaks  poorly  though  fluently.  French 
signs  abound ;  there  is  a  warehouse  for  wines  and 
brandies  from  the  heart  of  Southern  France ;  here  is  a 
funeral  notice,  printed  in  deepest  black :  "  The  friends 
of  Jean  Baptiste,"  etc.,  "are  respectfully  invited  to  be 
present  at  the  funeral,  which  will  take  place  at  pre- 
cisely    four     O'clock,    On     the    ."       The    notice     is      "A  lazy  negro,  recumbent  in  a  cart." 

on  black-edged  note-paper,  nailed  to  a  post.  Here  pass  a  group  of  French 
negroes,  the  buxom  girls  dressed  with  a  certain  grace,  and  with  gay ly- colored 
handkerchiefs  wound  about  an  unpardonable  luxuriance  of  wool.  Their  cavaliers 
are  clothed  mainly  in  antiquated  garments  rapidly  approaching  the  level  of  rags ; 
and  their  patois  resounds  for  half-a-dozen  blocks. 

Turning  into  a  side  street  leading  off  from  Royal,  or  Chartres,  or  Bourgogne, 
or  Dauphin,  or  Rampart  streets,  you  come  upon  an  odd  little  shop,  where  the 
cobbler  sits  at  his  work  in  the  shadow  of  a  grand  old  Spanish  arch;  or  upon  a 
nest  of  curly-headed  negro  babies  ensconced  on  a  tailor's  bench  at  the  window 
of  a  fine  ancient  mansion ;  or  you  look  into  a  narrow  room,  glass-fronted,  and 
see  a  long  and  well-spread  table,  surrounded  by  twenty  Frenchmen  and  French- 
women, all  talking  at  once  over  their  eleven  o'clock  breakfast. 

Or  you  may  enter  aristocratic  restaurants,  where  the  immaculate  floors 
are  only  surpassed  in  cleanliness  by  the  spotless  linen  of  the  tables ;    where  a 


30 


PICTURES      FROM     THE     STREETS. 


solemn  dignity,  as  befits  the  refined  pleasure  of  dinner,  prevails,  and  where 
the  waiter  gives  you  the  names  of  the  dishes  in  both  languages,  and  bestows  on 
you  a  napkin  large  enough  to  serve  you  as  a  shroud,  if  this  strange  melange  of 
French  and  Southern  cookery  should  give  you  a  fatal  indigestion.  The  French 
families  of  position  usually  dine  at  four,  as  the  theatre  begins  promptly  at  seven, 
both  on  Sundays  and  week  days.  There  is  the  play-bill,  in  French,  of  course ; 
and  there  are  the  typical  Creole  ladies,  stopping  for  a  moment  to  glance  at  it  as 
they  wend  their  way  shopward.  For  it  is  the  shopping  hour ;  from  eleven  to 
two  the  streets  of  the  old  quarter  are  alive  with  elegantly,  yet  soberly  attired 
ladies,  always  in  couples,  as  French  etiquette  exacts  that  the  unmarried  lady  shall 
never  promenade  without  her  maid  or  her  mother. 

One  sees  beautiful  faces  on  the  Rue  Royale  (Royal  street),  and  in  the 
balconies  and  lodges  of  the  Opera  House ;  sometimes,  too,  in  the  cool  of  the 
evening,  there  are  fascinating  little  groups  of  the  daughters  of  Creoles  on  the 
balconies,  gayly  chatting  while  the  veil  of  the  twilight  is  torn  away,  and 
the  glory  of  the  Southern  moonlight  is  showered  over  the  quiet  streets. 

The  Creole  ladies  are  not,  as  a  rule,  so  highly  educated  as  the  gracious 
daughters  of  the  "American  quarter;"  but  they  have  an  indefinable  grace,  a 
savoir  in  dress,  and  a  piquant  and  alluring  charm  in  person  and  conversation, 
which  makes  them  universal  favorites  in  society. 

One  of  the  chiefest  of  their  attractions  is  the  staccato  and  queerly-colored 
English,  really  French  in  idea  and  accent,  which  many  of  them  speak.  At 
the  Saturday  matinees,  in  the  opera  or  comedy  season  at  the  French  Theatre, 
you  will  see  hundreds  of  the  ladies  of  "  the  -quarter ;"  and  rarely  can  a  finer 

grouping    of    lovely    brunettes    be    found ; 
lowhere    a    more    tastefully  -  dressed    and 
elegantly  -  mannered  assembly. 

The  quiet  which  has  reigned  in  the  old 
French  section  since  the  war  ended  is,  per- 
haps, abnormal ;  but  it  would  be  difficult  to 
find  village  streets  more  tranquil  than  are  the 
main  avenues  of  this  foreign  quarter  after 
nine  at  night.  The  long,  splendid  stretches 
of  Rampart  and  Esplanade  streets,  with  their 
rows  of  trees  planted  in  the  centre  of  the 
driveways, — the  whitewashed  trunks  giving 
a  fine  effect  of  green  and  white, — are  peace- 
ful ;  the  negro  nurses  stroll  on  the  sidewalks, 
chattering  in  quaint  French  to  the  little 
children  of  their  former  masters — now  their 
"  employers." 

There  is  no  attempt  on  the  part  of  the 
French  or  Spanish  families  to  inaugurate 
stvle  and  fashion  in  the  city;   quiet  home 

'  The  negro  nurses  stroll  on  the  sidewalks,  chattering  . '  ,   V  i  •  '     i       jL  „„«.„:_„     ~f 

in  quaint  French  to  the  little  children."  society,     match- making   and    marrying    01 


e  ladies  < 


SOCIETY     AND      CHARACTER. 


31 


daughters,  games  and  dinner  parties,  church,  shopping,  and  calls  in  simple  and 
unaffected  manner,  content  them. 

The  majority  of  the  people  in  the  whole  quarter  seem  to  have  a  total  disregard 
of  the  outside  world,  and  when  one  hears  them  discussing  the  distracted  condition 
of  local  politics,  one  can  almost  fancy  them  gossiping  on  matters  entirely  foreign 
to  them,  instead  of  on  those  vitally  connected  with  their  lives  and  property. 
ThTey  live  very  much  among  themselves.  French  by  nature  and  training,  they  get 
but  a  faint  reflection  of  the  excitements  in  these  United  States.  It  is  also  aston- 
ishing to  see  how  little  the  ordinary  American  citizen  of  New  Orleans  knows  of 
his  French  neighbors;  how  ill  he  ap- 
preciates them.  It  is  hard  for  him  to 
talk  five  minutes  about  them  without 
saying,  "Well,  we  have  a  non- progres- 
sive element  here ;  it  will  not  be  con- 
verted." Having  said  which,  he  will 
perhaps  paint  in  -glowing  colors  the  vir- 
tues and  excellences  of  his  French 
neighbors,  though  he  cannot  forgive 
them  for  taking  so  little  interest  in 
public  affairs. 

Here  we  are  again  at  the  Arch- 
bishop's Palace,  once  the  home  of  the 
Ursuline  nuns,  who  now  have,  further 
down  the  river,  a  splendid  new  convent 
and  school,  surrounded  by  beautiful 
gardens.  This  ancient  edifice  was  com- 
pleted by  the  French  Government  in 
1733,  and  is  the  oldest  in  Louisiana. 
Its  Tuscan  composite  architecture,  its 
porter's  lodge,   and  its  interior   garden  "The  interior  garden,  with  its  curious  shrine." 

with  its  curious  shrine,  make  it  well  worth  preserving,  even  when  the  tide  of 
progress  shall  have  reached  this  nook  on  Conde  street.  The  Ursuline  nuns 
occupied  this  site  for  nearly  a  century,  and  it  was  abandoned  by  them  only 
because  they  were  tempted,  by  the  great  rise  in  real  estate  in  that  vicinity,  to 
sell.  The  new  convent  is  richly  endowed,  and  is  one  of  the  best  seminaries  in 
the  South. 

Many  of  the  owners  of  property  in  the  vicinity  of  the  Archbishop  s  Palace 
have  removed  to  France,  since  the  war,  —  doing  nothing  for  the  benefit  of  the 
metropolis  which  gave  them  their  fortunes.  The  rent  of  these  solidly-con- 
structed old  houses  once  brought  them  a  sum  which,  when  translated  from 
dollars  into  francs,  was  colossal,  and  which  the  Parisian  tradesmen  tucked  away 
into  their  strong  boxes.  Now  they  get  almost  nothing ;  the  houses  are  mainly 
vacant.  With  the  downfall  of  slavery,  and  the  advent  of  reconstruction,  came 
such  radical  changes  in  Louisiana  politics  and  society  that  those  belonging 
to  the  ancien  regime  who  could  flee,  fled ;   and  a  prominent  historian  and  gen- 


32 


THE  REVOLUTION  —  ITS  EFFECTS. 


The  New  Ursuline  Convent — New  Orleans. 


tleman  of  most  honorable  Creole  descent  told  me  that,  among  his  immense 
acquaintance,  he  did  not  know  a  single  person  who  would  not  leave  the  State 
if  means  were  at  hand. 

The  grooves  in  which  society  in  Louisiana  and  New  Orleans  had  run  before 

the  late  struggle 
were  so  broken 
that  even  a  resi- 
dence in  the  State 
was  distasteful  to 
him  and  the  so- 
ciety he  represent- 
ed ;  since  the  late 
war,  he  said,  500 
years  seemed  to 
have  passed  over 
the  common- 
wealth. The  Italy  of  Augustus  was  not  more  dissimilar  to  the  Italy  of  to-day 
than  is  the  Louisiana  of  to-day  to  the  Louisiana  before  the  war.  There  was  no 
longer  the  spirit  to  maintain  the  grand,  unbounded  hospitality  once  so  charac- 
teristic of  the  South.  Formerly,  the  guest  would  have  been  presented  to 
planters  who  would  have  entertained  him  for  days,  in  royal  style,  and  who 
would  have  sent  him  forward  in  their  own  carriages,  commended  to  the  hos- 
pitality of  their  neighbors.  Now  these  same  planters  were  living  upon  corn 
and  pork.  "Most  of  these  people,"  said  the  gentleman,  "have  vanished  from 
their  homes;  and  I  actually  know  ladies  of  culture  and  refinement,  whose  incomes 
were  gigantic  before  the  war,  who  are  'washing'  for  their  daily  bread.  The 
misery,  the  despair,  in  hundreds  of  cases,  are  beyond  belief." 

"Many  lovely  plantations,"  said  he,  "are  entirely  deserted;  the  negroes 
will  not  remain  upon  them,  but  flock  into  the  cities,  or  work  on  land  which  they 
have  purchased  for  themselves."  He  would  not  believe  that  the  free  negro  did 
as  much  work  for  himself  as  he  formerly  did  for  his  master.  He  considered  the 
labor  system  at  the  present  time  terribly  onerous  for  planters.  The  negroes 
were  only  profitable  as  field  hands  when  they  worked  on  shares,  the  planters 
furnishing  them  land,  tools,  horses,  mules,  and  advancing  them  food.  He  said 
that  he  would  not  himself  hire  a  negro  even  at  small  wages;  he  did  not  believe 
it  would  be  profitable.  The  discouragement  of  the  natives  of  Louisiana,  he 
believed,  arose  in  large  degree  from  the  difficulty  of  obtaining  capital  with  which 
to  begin  anew.  He  knew  instances  where  only  $10,000  or  $20,000  were  needed 
for  the  improvement  of  water  power,  or  of  lands  which  would  net  hundreds  of 
thousands.  He  had  himself  written  repeatedly,  urging  people  at  the  North  to 
invest,  but  they  would  not,  and  alleged  that  they  should  not  alter  their  deter- 
mination so  long  as  the  present  political  condition  prevailed. 

He  added,  with  great  emphasis,  that  he  did  not  think  the  people  of  the  North 
would  believe  a  statement  which  should  give  a  faithful  transcript  of  the  present 
condition    of   affairs    in    Louisiana.       The    natives    of    the    State    could    hardly 


THE      SHADOW      OVER      LOUISIANA.  33 

realize  it  themselves  ;  and  it  was  not  to  be  expected  that  strangers,  of  differ- 
ing habits  of  life  and  thought,  should  do  it.  He  did  not  blame  the  negro  for 
his  present  incapacity,  as  he  considered  the  black  man  an  inferior  being, 
peculiarly  unfitted  by  ages  of  special  training  for  what  he  was  now  called 
upon  to  undertake.  The  negro  was,  he  thought,  by  nature,  kindly,  gen- 
erous, courteous,  susceptible  of  civilization  only  to  a  certain  degree ;  devoid 
of  moral  consciousness,  and  usually,  of  course,  ignorant.  Not  one  out  of  a 
hundred,  the  whole  State  through,  could  write  his  name;  and  there  had  been 
fifty-five  in  one  single  Legislature  who  could  neither  read  nor  write.  There  was, 
according  to  him,  scarcely  a  single  man  of  color  in  the  last  Legislature  who  was 
competent  in  any  large  degree. 

The  Louisiana  white  people  were  in  such  terror  of  the  negro  government  that 
they  would  rather  accept  any  other  despotism.  A  military  dictator  would  be 
far  preferable  to  them ;  they  would  go  anywhere  to  escape  the  ignominy  to 
which  they  were  at  present  subjected.  The  crisis  was  demoralizing  everyone.' 
Nobody  worked  with  a  will ;  every  one  was  in  debt.  There  was  not  a  single 
piece  of  property  in  the  city  of  New  Orleans  in  which  he  would  at  present 
invest,  although  one  could  now  buy  for  $5,000  or  $10,000  property  originally 
worth  $50,000.  He  said  it  would  not  pay  to  purchase,  the  taxes  were  so 
enormous.  The  majority  of  the  great  plantations  had  been  deserted  on  account 
of  the  excessive  taxation.  Only  those  familiar  with  the  real  causes  of  the 
despair  could  imagine  how  deep  it  was. 

Benefit  by  immigration,  he  maintained,  was  impossible  under  the  present 
regime.  New-comers  mingled  in  the  distracted  politics  in  such  a  manner  as  to 
neglect  the  development  of  the  country.  Thousands  of  the  citizens  were  fleeing 
to  Texas  (and  I  could  vouch  for  the  correctness  of  that  assertion).  He  said 
that  the  mass  of  immigrants  became  easily  discouraged  and  broken  down, 
because  they  began  by  working  harder  than  the  climate  would  permit. 

In  some  instances,  Germans  on  coming  into  the  State  had  been  ordered 
by  organizations  both  of  white  and  colored  native  workmen  not  to  labor  so 
much  daily,  as  they  were  setting  a  dangerous  example  !  Still,  he  believed 
that  almost  any  white  man  would  do  as  much  work  as  three  negroes.  He 
hardly  thought  that  in  fifty  years  there  would  be  any  negroes  in  Louisiana. 
The  race  was  rapidly  diminishing.  Planters  who  had  owned  three  or  four  hun- 
dred slaves  before  the  war,  had  kept  a  record  of  their  movements,  and  found 
that  more  than  half  of  them  had  died  of  want  and  neglect.  The  negroes  did 
not  know  how  to  care  for  themselves.  The  women  now  on  the  same  plantations 
where  they  had  been  owned  as  slaves  gave  birth  to  only  one  child  where  they 
had  previously  borne  three.  They  would  not  bear  children  as  of  old;  the  negro 
population  was  rapidly  decreasing.  Gardening,  he  said,  had  proved  an  un- 
profitable experiment,  because  of  the  thievish  propensities  of  the  negro.  All 
the  potatoes,  turnips,  and  cabbages  consumed  by  the  white  people  of  New 
Orleans  came  from  the  West 

Such  was  the  testimony  of  one  who,  although  by  no  means  unfair  or  bitterly 
partisan,  perhaps  allowed  his  discouragement  to  color  all  his  views.     He  frankly 
3 


34  DISCOURAGEMENT     AND      DESPAIR. 

accepted  the  results  of  the  war,  so  far  as  the  abolition  of  slavery  and  the 
consequent  ruin  of  his  own  and  thousands  of  other  fortunes  were  concerned  ;  he 
has,  indeed,  borne  with  all  the  evils  which  have  arisen  out  of  reconstruction, 
without  murmuring  until  now,  when  he  and  thousands  of  his  fellows  are  pushed 
to  the  wall.  He  is  the  representative  of  a  very  large  class ;  the  discouragement 
is  no  dream.  It  is  written  on  the  faces  of  the  citizens ;  you  may  read  and 
realize  it  there. 

Ah!  these  faces,  these  faces; — expressing  deeper  pain,  profounder  discontent 
than  were  caused  by  the  iron  fate  of  the  few  years  of  the  war  !  One  sees  them 
everywhere ;  on  the  street,  at  the  theatre,  in  the  salon,  in  the  cars ;  and  pauses 
for  a  moment,  struck  with  the  expression  of  entire  despair — of  complete  helpless- 
ness, which  has  possessed  their  features.  Sometimes  the  owners  of  the  faces  are 
one-armed  and  otherwise  crippled ;  sometimes  they  bear  no  wounds  or  marks 
ot  wounds,  and  are  in  the  prime  and  fullness  of  life ;  but  the  look  is  there  still. 
Now  and  then  it  is  controlled  by  a  noble  will,  the  pain  of  which  it  tells  having 
been  trampled  under  the  feet  of  a  great  energy ;  but  it  is  always  there.  The 
struggle  is  over,  peace  has  been  declared,  but  a  generation  has  been  doomed. 
The  past  has  given  to  the  future  the  dower  of  the  present ;  there  seems  only  a 
dead  level  of  uninspiring  struggle  for  those  going  out,  and  but  small  hope 
for  those  coming  in.  That  is  what  the  faces  say ;  that  is  the  burden  of  their 
sadness. 

These  are  not  of  the  loud-mouthed  and  bitter  opponents  of  everything  tend- 
ing to  reconsolidate  the  Union ;  these  are  not  they  who  will  tell  you  that  some 
day  the  South  will  be  united  once  more,  and  will  rise  in  strength  and  strike  a 
blow  for  freedom ;  but  they  are  the  payers  of  the  price.  The  look  is  on  the 
faces  of  the  men  who  wore  the  swords  of  generals  who  led  in  disastrous 
measures;  on  the  faces  of  women  who  have  lost  husbands,  children,  lovers, 
fortunes,  homes,  and  comfort  for  evermore.  The  look  is  on  the  faces  of  the 
strong  fighters,  thinkers,  and  controllers  of  the  Southern  mind  and  heart;  and 
here  in  Louisiana  it  will  not  brighten,  because  the  wearers  know  that  the 
great  evils  of  disorganized  labor,  impoverished  society,  scattered  families,  race 
legislation,  retributive  tyranny  and  terrorism,  with  the  power,  like  Nemesis  of 
old,  to  wither  and  blast,  leave  no  hope  for  this  generation.  Heaven  have 
mercy  on  them !  Their  fate  is  too  utterly  inevitable  not  to  command  the 
strongest  sympathy. 

Of  course,  in  the  French  quarter,  there  are  multitudes  of  negroes  who  speak 
both  French  and  English  in  the  quaintest,  most  outlandish  fashion;  eliding  whole 
syllables  which  seem  necessary  to  sense,  and  breaking  into  extravagant  excla- 
mations on  the  slightest  pretext.  The  French  of  the  negroes  is  very  much  like 
that  of  young  children;  spo"ken  far  from  plainly,  but  with  a  pretty  grace 
which  accords  poorly  with  the  exteriors  of  the  speakers.  The  negro  women, 
young  and  old,  wander  about  the  streets  bareheaded  and  barearmed;  now  tug- 
ging their  mistresses'  children,  now  carrying  huge  baskets  on  their  heads,  and 
walking  under  their  heavy  burdens  with  the  gravity  of  queens.  Now  and 
then   one  sees  a  mulatto   girl  hardly  less  fair   than    the  brown   maid   he    saw 


NEGRO      CUSTOMS      AND      MANNERS. 


35 


at  Sorrento,  or  in  the  vine-covered  cottage  at  the  little  mountain  town  near 
Rome ;  now  a  giant  matron,  black  as  the  tempest,  and  with  features  as  pro- 
nounced in  savagery  as  any  of  her  Congo  ancestors. 

But  the  negroes,  taken  as  a  whole,  seem  somewhat  shuffling  and  disor- 
ganized; and  apart  from  the  statuesque  old  house  and  body  servants,  who  appear 
to  have  caught  some  dignity  from  their  masters,  they  are  by  no  means  inviting. 
They  gather  in  groups  at  the  street  corners  just  at  nightfall,  .and  while  they 
chatter  like  monkeys,  even  about  politics,  they  gesticulate  violently.  They 
live  without  much  work,  for  their  wants  are  few ;  and  two  days'  labor  in  a 
week,  added  to  the  fat  roosters  and  turkeys  that  will  walk  into  their  clutches, 
keeps  them  in  bed  and  board.  They  find  ample  amusement  in  the  "  heat  o'  the 
sun,"   the  passers-by,  and  tobacco.      There   are  families  of  color   noticeable  for 


"And  while  they  chatter  like  monkeys,  even  about  politics,  they  gesticulate  violently,'' 

intelligence  and    accomplishments ,    but,   as    a  rule,   the    negro    ot  the  French 
quarter  is  thick-headed,  light-hearted,  improvident,  and  not  too  conscientious. 

Perhaps  one  of  the  most  patent  proofs  of  the  poverty  now  so  bitterly  felt 
among  the  hitherto  well-to-do  families  in  New  Orleans  was  apparent  in  the 
suspension  of  the  opera  in  the  winter  of  1873.  Heretofore  the  Crescent  City  has 
rejoiced  in  brilliant  seasons,  both  the  French  and  Americans  uniting  in  sub- 
scriptions sufficient  to  bring  to  them  artists  of  unrivaled  talent  and  culture. 
But  opera  entailed  too  heavy  an  expense,  when  the  people  who  usually  supported 
it  were  prostrate  under  the  hands  of  plunderers,  and  a  comedy  company  from 
the  Paris  theatres  took  its  place  upon  the  lyric  stage.  The  French  Opera  House 
is  a  handsomely  arranged  building  of  modern  construction,  at  the  corner  of 
Bourbon  and  Toulouse  streets.  The  interior  is  elegantly  decorated,  and  now 
during  the  season  of  six  months  the  salle  is  nightly  visited  by  hundreds  of  the 
subscribers,  who  take  tickets  for  the  whole  season,  and  by  the  city's  floating 
population.      Between  each  act  of  the  pieces  all  the  men  in  the  theatre  rise,  stalk 


36 


THE      OPERA      IN      NEW     ORLEANS. 


out,  puff  cigarettes,  and  sip  iced  raspberry- water  and  absinthe  in  the  cafes, 
returning  in  a  long  procession  just  as  the  curtain  rises  again;  while  the  ladies 
receive  the  visits  of  friends  in  the  loges  or  in  the  private  boxes,  which  they 
often  occupy  four  evenings  in  the  week.  The  New  Orleans  public,  both  French 
and  American,  possesses  excellent  theatrical  taste,  and  is  severely  critical,  especi- 
ally in  opera.  It  is  difficult  to  find  a  Creole  family  of  any  pretensions  in  which 
music  is  not  cultivated  in  large  degree. 

People  in  the  French  quarter  very  generally  speak  both  prevailing  languages, 
while  the  majority  of  the  American  residents  do  not  affect  the  French.  The 
Gallic  children  all  speak  English,  and  in  the  street-plays  of  the  boys,  as  in  their 
conversation,  French  and  English  idioms  are  strangely  mingled.  American 
boys  call  birds,  fishes  and  animals  by  corrupted  French  names,  handed  down 
through  seventy  years  of  perversion,  and  a  dreadful  threat  on  the  part  of  Young 
America  is,  that  he  will  "mallerroo"  you,  which  seems  to  hint  that  our  old  French 
friend  malheureux,  "unhappy,"  has,  with  other  words,  undergone  corruption. 
When  an  American  boy  wishes  his  comrade  to  make  his  kite  fly  higher,  he  says, 
poussez  !  just  as  the  French  boy  does,  and  so  on  ad  infinitum. 

Any  stranger  who  remains  in  the  French  quarter  over  Sunday  will  be  amazed 
at  the  great  number  of  funeral  processions.  It  would  seem,  indeed,  as  if  death 
came  uniformly  near  the  end  of  the  week  in  order  that  people  might  be 
laid  away  on  the  Sabbath.  The  cemeteries,  old  and  new,  rich  and  poor, 
are  scattered  throughout  the  city,  and  most  of  them  present  an  extremely 
beautiful  appearance — the  white  tombs  nestling  among  the  dark-green  foliage. 
It  would  be  difficult  to  dig  a  grave  of  the  ordinary  depth  in  the  "  Louisiana 

lowlands"  without  coming  to  water; 
and,  consequently,  burials  in  sealed 
tombs  above  ground  are  universal. 
The  old  French  and  Spanish  cemete- 
ries present  long  streets  of  cemented 
walls,  with  apertures  into  which  once 
were  thrust  the  noble  and  good  of  the 
land,,  as  if  they  were  put  into  ovens 
to  be  baked ;  and  one  may  still  read 
queer  inscriptions,  dated  away  back  in 
the  middle  of  the  eighteenth  century. 
Great  numbers  of  the  monuments  both 
in  the  old  and  new  cemeteries  are  very 
imposing;  and,  one  sees  every  day,  as 
in  all  Catholic  communities,  long  pro- 
cessions of  mourning  relatives  carrying 
flowers  to  place  on  the  spot  where 
their  loved  and  lost  are  entombed ; 
or  catches  a  glimpse  of  some  black- 
robed  figure  sitting  motionless  before 
a  tomb.     The  St.   Louis  Cemetery  is 


"The  old  French  and  Spanish  cemeteries  present  long 
streets  of  cemented  walls." 


THE     ST.     LOUIS     HOTEL. 


37 


fine,  and  many  dead  are  even  better  housed  in  it  than  they  were  in  life.  The 
St.  Patrick,  Cypress  Grove,  Firemen's,  Odd  Fellows,  and  Jewish  cemeteries, 
in.  the  American  quarter,  are  filled  with  richly- wrought  tombs,  and  trav- 
ersed by  fine,  tree- planted  avenues. 

The  St.  Louis  Hotel  is  one  of  the  most  imposing  monuments  of  the  French 
quarter,  as  well  as  one  of  the  finest  hotels  in  the  United  States.  It  was 
originally  built  to  combine  a  city  exchange,  hotel,  bank,  ball-rooms,  and  private 
stores.  The  rotunda,  metamorphosed  into  a  dining-hall,  is  one  of  the  most  beau- 
tiful in  this  country,  and  the  great  inner 
circle  of  the  dome  is  richly  frescoed  with 
allegorical  scenes  and  busts  of  eminent 
Americans,  from  the  pencils  of  Canova 
and  Pinoli.  The  immense  ball-room 
is  also  superbly  decorated.  The  St. 
Louis  Hotel  was  very  nearly  destroyed 
by  fire  in  1840,  but  in  less  than  two 
years  was  restored  to  its  original  splen- 
dor. On  the  eastern  and  western  sides 
of  Jackson  Square  are  the  Pontalba 
buildings,  large  and  not  especially 
handsome  brick  structures,  erected  by 
the  Countess  Pontalba,  many  years 
ago.       Chartres    street,    and    all     the 

avenues     Contributing     tO     it,    are     thor-  The  St.  Louis  Hotel— New  Orleans. 

oughly  French  in  character ;  cafe's,  wholesale  stores,  pharmacies,  shops  for 
articles  of  luxury,  all  bear  evidence  of  Gallic  taste. 

Every  street  in  the*  old  city  has  its  legend,  either  humorous  or  tragical ;  and 
each  building  which  confesses  to  an  hundred  years  has  memories  of  foreign 
domination  hovering  about  it.  The  elder  families  speak  with  bated  breath  and 
touching  pride  of  their  "  ancestor  who  came  with  Bienville,"  or  with  such 
and  such  Spanish  Governors;  and  many  a  name  among  those  of  the  Creoles 
has  descended  untarnished  to  its  present  possessors  through  centuries  of  valor 
and  adventurous  achievement. 


III. 


THE     CARNIVAL  —  THE     FRENCH      MARKETS. 


CARNIVAL  keeps  its  hold  upon  the  people    along   the  Gulf  shore,    despite 
the    troubles,  vexations,  and  sacrifices  to  which    they  have  been  forced 
to   submit   since    the    social    revolution    began.     White    and    black  join    in    its 


The  Carnival— "White  and  Black  join  in  its  masquerading." 

masquerading,  and  the  Crescent  City  rivals  Naples  in  the  beauty  and  richness 
of  its  displays.  Galveston  has  caught  the  infection,  and  every  year  the  King  of 
the  Carnival  adds  a  city  to  the  domain  loyal  to  him.     The  saturnalia  practiced 


ORIGIN      OF      THE      CARNIVAL.  39 

before  the  entry  into  Lent  are  the  least  bit  practical,  because  Americans  find  it 
impossible  to  lay  aside  business  utterly  even  on  Mardi-Gras.  The  device  of 
the  advertiser  pokes  its  ugly  face  into  the  very  heart  of  the  masquerade,  and 
brings  base  reality,  whose  hideous  .features,  outlined  under  his  domino,  put  a 
host  of  sweet  illusions  to  flight. 

The  Carnival  in  New  Orleans  was  organized  in  1827,  when  a  number  of 
young  Creole  gentlemen,  who  had  recently  returned  from  Paris,  formed  a  street- 
procession  of  maskers.  It  did  not  create  a  profound  sensation — was  considered 
the  work  of  mad  wags;  and  the  festival  languished  until  1837,  when  there  was  a 
fine  parade,  which  was  succeeded  by  another  still  finer  in  1839.  From  two  o'clock 
in  the  afternoon  until  sunset  of  Shrove  Tuesday,  drum  and  fife,  valve  and 
trumpet,  rang  in  the  streets,  and  hundreds  of  maskers  cut  furious  antics,  and 
made  day  hideous.  Thereafter,  from  1840  to  1852,  Mardi-Gras  festival  had 
varying  popularity — such  of  the  townspeople  as  had  the  money  to  spend  now 
and  then  organizing  a  very  fantastic  and  richly-dressed  rout  of  mummers.  At 
the  old  Orleans  Theatre,  balls  of  princely  splendor  were  given ;  Europeans  even 
came  to  join  in  the  New  World's  Carnival,  and  wrote  home  enthusiastic  accounts 
of  it.  In  1857  the  "  Mistick  Krewe  of  Comus,"  a  private  organization  of  New 
Orleans  gentlemen,  made  their  debut,  and  gave  to  the  festivities  a  lustre  which, 
thanks  to  their  continued  efforts,  has  never  since  quitted  it.  In  1857  the 
"Krewe"  appeared  in  the  guise  of  supernatural  and  mythological  characters, 
and  flooded  the  town  with  gods  and  demons,  winding  up  the  occasion  with 
a  grand  ball  at  the  Gaiety  Theatre ;  previous  to  which  they  appeared  in 
tableaux  representing  the  "Tartarus"  of  the  ancients,  and  Milton's  "Paradise 
Lost."  In  1858  this  brilliant  coterie  of  maskers  renewed  the  enchantments  of 
Mardi-Gras,  by  exhibiting  the  gods  and  goddesses  of  high  Olympus  and  of  the 
fretful  sea,  and  again  gave  a  series  of  brilliant  tableaux.  In  1859  they  pictured 
the  revels  of  the  four  great  English  holidays,  May  Day,  Midsummer  Eve, 
Christmas  and  Twelfth  Night.  In  i860  they  illustrated  American  history  in  a 
series  of  superb  groups  of  living  statues  mounted  on  moving  pedestals.  In  1861 
they  delighted  the  public  with  "Scenes  from  Life" — Childhood,  Youth,  Man- 
hood and  Old  Age ;  and  the  ball  at  the  Varieties  Theatre  was  preceded  by  a 
series  of  grandiose  tableaux  which  exceeded  all  former  efforts.  Then  came  the 
war;  maskers  threw  aside  their  masks;  but,  in  1866,  after  the  agony  of  the  long 
struggle,  Comus  once  more  assembled  his  forces,  and  the  transformations  which 
Milton  attributed  to  the  sly  spirit  himself  were  the  subject  of  the  display.  The 
wondering  gazers  were  shown  how  Comus, 

"  Deep-skilled  in  all  his  mother's  witcheries, 
By  sly  enticement  gives  his  baneful  cup, 
With  many  murmurs  mixed,  whose  pleasing  poison 
The  visage  quite  transforms  of  him  that  drinks, 
And  the  inglorious  likeness  of  a  beast 
Fixes  instead." 

In  1867  Comus  became  Epicurean,  and  blossomed  into  a  walking  bill  of 
fare,  the  maskers  representing  everything  in  the  various  courses  and  entrees  of  a 


40 


THE      KREWE      OF      COMUS. 


gourmand's  dinner,  from  oysters  and  sherry  to  the  omelette  brulee,  the  Kirsch  and 
Curacoa.  A  long  and  stately  array  of  bottles,  dishes  of  meats  and  vegetables, 
and  desserts,  moved  through  the  streets,  awakening  saturnalian  laughter 
wherever  it  passed.  In  1868  the  Krewe  presented  a  procession  and  tableaux 
from  "Lalla  Rookh;"  in  1869,  the  ''Five  Senses;"  and  in  1870,  the  "History 
of  Louisaina;"  when  old  Father  Mississippi  himself,  De  Soto  and  his  fellow-dis- 
coverers, the  soldiers,  adventurers,  cavaliers,  Jesuits,  French,  Spanish,  and 
American  Governors,  were  all  paraded  before  the  amazed  populace.  In  1871, 
King  Comus  and  his  train  presented  picturesque  groupings  from  Spenser's 
"Faery  Queene;"  in  1872,  from  Homer's  "Tale  of  Troy;"  and  in  1873  detailed 
the  "  Darwinian  Development  of  the  Species"  from  earliest  beginnings  to  the 
gorilla,  and  thence  to  man.  The  Krewe  of  Comus  has  always  paid  the  expenses 
of  these  displays  itself,  and  has  issued  invitations  only  to  as  many  people  as 
could  be  accommodated  within  the  walls  of  the  theatre  to  witness  the  tableaux. 
It  is  composed  of  one  hundred  members,  who  are  severally  sworn  to  conceal 
their  identity  from  all  outsiders,  and  who  have  thus  far  succeeded  admirably  in 
accomplishing  this  object.  The  designs  for  their  masks  are  made  in  New 
Orleans,  and  the  costumes  are  manufactured  from  them  in  Paris  yearly.  In 
1870  appeared  the  " Twelfth- Night  Revelers" — who  yearly  celebrate  the  beauti- 
ful anniversary  of  the  visit  of  the  wise  men  of  the  East  to  the  manger  of  the 
Infant  Saviour.     In  1870  the  pageants  of  this  organization  were  inaugurated  by 


"The  coming  of  Rex,  most  puissant  King  of  Carnival."    [Page  41. J 


THE      COMING      OF      THE      KING. 


41 


"  The  Lord  of  Misrule  and  his  Knights;"  in  187 1,  "  Mother  Goose's  Tea  Party" 
was  given;  in  1872,  a  group  of  creations  of  artists  and  poets  and  visionaries, 
from  lean  Don  Quixote  to  fat  Falstaff,  followed;  and  in  1873  the  birds  were 
represented,  in  a  host  of  fantastic  and  varied  tableaux. 

Another  feature  has  been  added  to  the  festivities,  one  which  promises  in  time 
to  be  most  attractive  of  all.      It  is  the  coming  of  Rex,  most  puissant  King  of 


"The  Boeuf-Gras — the  fat  ox — is  led  in  the  procession."      [Page  42.] 

Carnival.  This  amiable  dignitary,  depicted  as  a  venerable  man,  with  snow-white 
hair  and  beard,  but  still  robust  and  warrior-like,  made  his.  first  appearance  on  the 
Mississippi  shores  in  1872,  and  issued  his  proclamations  through  newspapers  and 
upon  placards,  commanding  all  civil  and  military  authorities  to  show  subservience 
to  him  during  his  stay  in  "our  good  city  of  New  Orleans."'  Therefore,  yearly, 
when  the  date  of  the  recurrence  of  Mardi-Gras  has  been  fixed,  the  mystic  King 
issues  his  proclamation,  and  is  announced  as  having  arrived  at  New  York,  or 
whatever  other  port  seemeth  good.  At  once  thereafter,  and  daily,  ,the  papers 
teem  with  reports  of  his  progress  through  the  country,  interspersed  with  anec- 
dotes of  his  heroic  career,  which  is  supposed  to  have  lasted  for  many  centuries. 
The  court  report  is  usually  conceived  somewhat  in  the  style  of  the  following 
paragraph,  supposed  to  be  an  anecdote  told  at  the  "palace"  by  an  "old  gray- 
headed  sentinel:" 

"  Another  incident,  illustrating  the  King's  courageous  presence  of  mind,  was 
related  by  the  veteran.  While  sojourning  at  Auch  (this  was  several  centuries 
ago),  a  wing  of  the  palace  took  fire,  the  whole  staircase  was  in  flames,  and  in  the 
highest  story  was  a  feeble  old  woman,  apparently  cut  off  from  any  means  of 
escape.      His  Majesty  offered  two  thousand  francs  to  any  one  who  would  save 


42 


THE      RECEPTION     PARADE. 


her  from  destruction,  but  no  one  pre- 
sented himself.  The  King  did  not  <stop 
to  deliberate;  he  wrapped  his  robes 
closely  about  him,  called  for  a  wet  cloth 
— which  he  threw  aside — then  rushed 
to  his  carriage,  and  drove  rapidly  to  the 
theatre,  where  he  passed  the  evening 
listening  to  the  singing  of  '  If  ever  I 
cease  to  love.' " 

This  is  published  seriously  in  the 
journals,  next  to  the  news  and  editorial 
paragraphs;  and  yearly,  at  one  o'clock 
on  the  appointed  day,  the  King,  ac- 
companied   by  Warwick,   Earl-Marshal 


'When  Rex  and 


his  train  enter  the  queer  old  streets,  the  balconies  are  crowded 
with  spectators. "      f  Page  43. ] 


of  the  Empire,  and  by  the 
Lord  High  Admiral,  who  is 
always  depicted  as  suffering 
untold  pangs  from  gout,  ar- 
rives on  Canal  street,  sur- 
rounded by  troops  of  horse 
and  foot,  fantastically  dressed, 
and  followed  by  hundreds  of 
maskers.  Sometimes  he 
comes  up  the  river  in  a 
beautiful  barge  and  lands 
amid  thunderous  salutes  from 
the  shipping  at  the  wharves. 
This  parade,  which  is  grad- 
ually becoming  one  of  the 
important  features  of  the  Car- 
nival, is  continued  through 
all  the  principal  streets  of  the 
city.  The  Boeuf-Gras — the 
fat  ox  —is  led  in  the  proces- 


THE      BCEUF      GRAS CARNIVAL      SPORTS. 


43 


sion.  The  animal  is  gayly  decorated  with  flowers  and  garlands.  Mounted  on 
pedestals  extemporized  from  cotton-floats  are  dozens  of  allegorical  groups,  and 
the  masks,  although  not  so  rich  and  costly  as  those  of  Comus  and  his  crew,  are 
quite  as  varied  and  mirth-provoking.  The  costumes  of  the  King  and  his  suite 
are  gorgeous;  and  the  troops  of  the  United  States,  disguised  as  privates  of 
Arabian  artillery  and  as  Egyptian  spahis,  do  escort-duty  to  his  Majesty.  Rumor 
hath  it,  even,  that  on  one  occasion,  the  ladies  of  New  Orleans  presented  a  flag  to 
an  officer  of  the  troops  of  "King  Rex"  (sic),  little  suspecting  that  it  was  there- 
after to  grace  the  Federal  barracks.  Thus  the  Carnival  has  its  pleasant 
waggeries    and    surprises. 

Froissart  thought  the  English  amused  themselves  sadly ;  and  indeed,  com- 
paring the  Carnival  in  Louisiana  with  the  Carnival  in  reckless  Italy,  one  might 
say  that  the  Americans  masquerade  grimly.  There  is  but  little  of  that  wild 
luxuriance  of  fun  in  the  streets  of  New  Orleans  which  has  made  Italian 
cities  so  famous ;  people  go  to  their  sports  with  an  air  of  pride,  but  not  of 
all-pervading  enjoyment.  In  the  French  quarter,  when  Rex  and  his  train  enter 
the  queer  old  streets,  there  are  shoutings,  chaffings,  and  dancings  ,  the  children 
chant  little  couplets  on  Mardi-Gras;  and  the  balconies  are  crowded  with  spec- 
tators. But,  the  negroes  make  a  somewhat  sorry  show  in  the  masking ;  their 
every-day  garb  is  more  picturesque. 

Carnival  culminates  at  night,  after  Rex  and  the  "day  procession"  have  retired. 


'The  joyous,  grotesque  maskers  appear  upon  the  ball-room  floor."     [Page  44.] 


44  MASQUERADES THE      KING   S      AUTHORITY. 

Thousands  of  people  assemble  in  dense  lines  along  the  streets  included  in  the 
published  route  of  march ;  Canal  street  is  brilliant  with  illumination,  and  swarms 
of  persons  occupy  every  porch,  balcony,  house-top,  pedestal,  carriage  and  mule- 
car.  Then  comes  the  train  of  Com  us,  and  torch-bearers,  disguised  in  outre 
masks,  light  up  the  way.  After  the  round  through  the  great  city  is  completed, 
the  reflection  of  the  torch-light  on  the  sky  dies  away,  and  the  Krewe  betake 
themselves  to  the  Varieties  Theatre,  and  present  tableaux  belore  the  ball  opens. 

This  theatre,  during  the  hour  or  two  preceding  the  Mardi-Gras  ball,  offers 
one  of  the  loveliest  sights  in  Christendom.  From  floor  to  ceiling,  the 
parquet,  dress-circle  and  galleries  are  one  mass  of  dazzling  toilets,  none  but 
ladies  being  given  seats.  White  robes,  delicate  faces,  dark,  flashing  eyes, 
luxuriant  folds  of  glossy  hair,  tiny,  faultlessly-gloved  hands, —  such  is  the  vision 
that  one  sees  through  his  opera-glass. 

Delicious  music  swells  softly  on  the  perfumed  air  ;  the  tableaux  wax  and 
wane  like  kaleidoscopic  effects,  when  suddenly  the  curtain  rises,  and  the  joyous, 
grotesque  maskers  appear  upon  the  ball-room  floor.  They  dance;  gradually 
ladies  and  their  cavaliers  leave  all  parts  of  the  galleries,  and  come  to  join  them  ; 
and  then, 

"No  sleep  till  morn,  when  youth  and  pleasure  meet, 
To  chase  the  glowing  hours  with  flying  feet." 

Meantime,  the  King  of  the  Carnival  holds  a  levee  and  dancing  party  at 
another  place ;  all  the  theatres  and  public  halls  are  delivered  up  to  the  vota- 
ries of  Terpsichore ;  and  the  fearless,  who  are  willing  to  usher  in  Lent  with 
sleepless  eyes,  stroll  home  in  the  glare  of  the  splendid  Southern  sunrise,  yearly 
vowing  that  each  Mardi-Gras  has  surpassed  its  predecessor. 

Business  in  New  Orleans  is  not  only  entirely  suspended  on  Shrove  Tuesday 
(Mardi-Gras),  but  the  Carnival  authorities  have  absolute  control  of  the  city. 
They  direct  the  police ;  they  arrest  the  mayor,  and  he  delivers  to  them  the  keys, 
while  the  chief  functionaries  of  the  city  government  declare  their  allegiance 
to  "  Rex ;"  addresses  are  delivered,  and  the  processions  move.  The  theatres 
are  thrown  open  to  the  public,  and  woe  betide  the  unhappy  manager  who 
dares  refuse  the  order  of  the  King  to  this  effect.  On  one  occasion  a  well- 
known  actor  arrived  in  the  city  during  the  festivities  to  fulfill  an  engagement, 
but  as  the  managers  of  the  theatre  at  which  he  was  to  act  had  refused 
to  honor  the  King's  command  for  free  admission  to  all,,  the  actor  was  at  once 
arrested,  taken  to  the  "den"  of  the  Earl- Marshal,  and  there  kept  a  close 
prisoner  until  a  messenger  arrived  to  say  that  the  recalcitrant  manager  had 
at  last  "acknowledged  the  corn."  The  violet  is  the  royal  flower;  the  imperial 
banner  is  of  green  and  purple,  with  a  white  crown  in  the  centre ;  and  the  anthem 
of  the  mystic  monarch  is,  "  If  ever  I  cease  to  love."  The  accumulation  of 
costumes  and  armor,  all  of  which  are  historically  accurate,  is  about  to  result  in 
the  establishment  of  a  valuable  museum. 

The  artist's  pencil  has  reproduced  in  these  pages  one  of  the  many  comical 
incidents  which  enliven  the  Carnival  tide,  and  calls  his  life  sketch  "  Beauty  and 


STREET      CRIES      AND      STREET      SCENES. 


45 


>:■ 


.'"■'  nf^^^^T'.-  i 


the  Beast."  From  the  gallery  of  the 
Varieties  Theatre,  many  bright  eyes  are 
in  vain  endeavoring  to  pierce  the  dis- 
guise under  which  a  fashionable  member 
of  the  Comus  Krewe  parades  before 
their  gaze. 

From  early  morning  until  nightfall 
the  same  quaint,  distorted  street-cfies 
which  one  hears  in  foreign  cities  ring 
through  the  streets  of  New  Orleans; 
and  in  the  French  quarter  they  are 
mirth-provoking,  under  their  guise  of 
Creole  patois.  The  Sicilian  fruit-sellers 
also  make  their  mellifluous  dialect  heard 
loudly ;  and  the  streets  always  resound 
to  the  high-pitched  voice  of  some  negro 
who  is  rehearsing  his  griefs  or  joys  in 
the  most  theatrical  manner.  Negro- 
beggars  encumber  the  steps  of  various 
banks  and  public  edifices,  sitting  for 
hours  together  with  open,  outstretched 
hands,  almost  too  lazy  to  close  them  over 
the  few  coins  the  passers-by  bestow.  A 
multitude  of  youthful  darkies,  who  have 
no  visible  aim  in  existence  but  to  sport 
in.  the  sun,  abound  in  the  American 
quarter,  apparently  well  fed  and  happy. 
The     mass    of  the    negroes    are    reck- 


Hlgi','in:iiinii|'iii':iiii' 


ililMlii|IMIill|ll|i|IIUjMH.ill», 


:  Many  bright 


eyes  are  ui  vain 
the    disguise. 


endeavoring  to  pierce 


46 


THE   NEW   ORLEANS   MARKETS. 


lessly  improvident,  living,  as  in  all 
cities,  crowded  together  in  ill-built 
and  badly-ventilated  cabins,  the 
ready  victims  for  almost  any  fell 
disease. 

Next  to  the  river  traffic,  the  New 
Orleans  markets  are  more  pic- 
turesque than  anything  else  apper- 
taining to  the  city.  They  lie  near 
the  levee,  and,  as  markets,  are  in- 
deed clean,  commodious,  and  always 
Avell  stocked.  But  they  have  an- 
other and  an  especial  charm  to  the 
traveler  from  the  North,  or  to  him 
who  has  never  seen  their  great 
counterparts  in  Europe.  The 
French  market  at  sunrise  on  Sun- 
day morning  is  the  perfection  of 
vivacious  traffic.  In  gazing  upon 
the  scene,  one  can  readily  imagine 
himself  in  some  city  beyond  the 
seas.  From  the  stone  houses,  bal- 
conied, and  fanciful  in  roof  and 
window,  come  hosts  of  plump  and 
pretty  young  negresses,  chatting  in 
their  droll  patois  with  monsieur  the 
fish- dealer,  before  his  wooden  bench, 
or  with  the  rotund  and  ever-laugh- 
ing madame  who  sells  little  piles 
of  potatoes,  arranged  on  a  shelf 
like  cannon  balls  at  an  arsenal,  or 
chaffering  with  the  fruit-merchant, 
while  passing  under  long,  hanging 
rows  of  odorous  bananas  and  pine- 
apples, and  beside  heaps  of  oranges, 
whose  color  contrasts  prettily  with 
the  swart  or  tawny  faces  of  the 
purchasers. 

During  the  morning  hours  of 
each  day,  the  markets  are  veritable 
bee-hives  of  industry ;  ladies  and 
servants  flutter  in  and  out  of  the 
long  passages  in  endless  throngs; 
but  in  the  afternoon  the  stalls  are 
nearly  all  deserted.     One  sees  deli- 


MARKET      TYPES 


47 


cious  types  in  these  markets ;  he  may  wander  for  months  in  New  Orleans  without 
meeting  them  elsewhere.  There  is  the  rich  savage  face  in  which  the  struggle  of 
Congo  with  French  or  Spanish  blood  is  still  going  on;  there  is  the  old  French 
market-woman,  with  her  irrepressible  form,  her  rosy  cheeks,  and  the  bandanna 


"Passing  under  long,  hanging  rows  ot  bananas  and  pine-apples."     [Page  46. J 

wound  about  her  head,  just  as  one  may  find  her  to  this  day  at  the  Halles 
Centrales  in  Paris;  there  is  the  negress  of  the  time  of  D'Artaguette,  renewed  in 
some  of  her  grandchildren ;  there  is  the  plaintive-looking  Sicilian  woman,  who 
has  been  bullied  all  the  morning  by  rough  negroes  and  rougher  white  men  as 
she  sold  oranges;  and  there  is  her  dark,  ferocious-looking  husband,  who  handles 
his  cigarette  as  if  he  were  strangling  an  enemy.  ,' 

In  a  long  passage,  between  two  of  the  market  buildings,  where  hundreds 
of  people  pass  hourly,  sits  a  silent  Louisiana  Indian  woman,  with  a  sack  of 
gumbo  spread  out  before  her,  and  with  eyes  downcast,  as  if  expecting  harsh 
words  rather  than  purchasers. 

Entering  the  clothes  market,  one  finds  lively  Gallic  versions  of  the  Hebrew 
female  tending  shops  where  all  articles  are  labeled  at  such  extraordinarily  low 
rates  that  the  person  who  manufactured  them  must  have  given  them  away;  qua- 
vering old  men,  clad  in  rusty  black,  who  sell  shoe-strings  and  cheap  cravats, 
but  who  have  hardly  vitality  enough  to  keep  the  flies  off  from  themselves,  not 
to  speak  of  waiting  on  customers ;  villainous  French  landsharks,  who  have 
eyes  as  sharp  for  the  earnings  of  the  fresh-water  sailor  as  ever  had  a  Gotham 


48 


A      BABEL      OF      TRADE 


shanghai  merchant  for  those  of  a  salt-water  tar;  mouldy  old  dames,  who  look 
daggers  at  you  if  you  venture  to  insist  that  any  article  in  their  stock  is  not 
of  finest  fabric  and  quality;  and  hoarse- voiced,  debauched  Creole  men,  who 
almost  cling  to  you  in  the  energy  of  their  pleading  for  purchases.  Some- 
times, too,  a  beautiful  black-robed  girl  leans-  over  a  counter,  displaying  her 
superbly -moulded  arms,  as  she  adjusts  her  knitting- work.  And  from  each 
and  every  one  of  the  markets  the  noise  rises  in  such  thousand  currents  of 
patois,  of  French,  of  English,  of  good-natured  and  guttural  negro  accent, 
that  one  cannot  help  wondering  how  it  is  that  buyer  and  seller  ever  come 
to    any  understanding  at  all. 

Then  there  are  the  flowers!  Such  marvelous  bargains  as  one  can  have  in 
bouquets!  Delicate  jessamines,  modest  knots  of  white  roses,  glorious  orange 
blossoms,  camelias,  red  roses,  tender  pansies,  exquisite  verbenas,  the  luscious 
and  perfect  virgin's  bower,  and  the  magnolia  in  its  season; — all  these  are 
to  be  had  in  the  markets  for  a  trivial  sum.  Sometimes,  when  a  Havana 
or  a  Sicilian  vessel  is  discharging  her  cargo,  fruit  boxes  are  broken  open ; 
and  then  it  is  a  treat  to  see  swarms  of  African  children  hovering  about  the 
tempting  piles,  from  which  even  the  sight  of  stout  cudgels  will  not  frighten 
them. 

In  the  winter  months  the  markets  are  crowded  with  strangers  before  six 
o'clock  every  morning.      Jaunty  maids  from  New  England  stroll  in  the  passages, 


%i 


"One  sees  delicious  types  in  these  markets."     [Page  47.] 


MORNINGS      IN     THE     MARKETS. 


49 


"In  a  long  passage,  between  two  of  the  market  buildings,  sits  a  silent 
Louisiana  Indian  woman."     [Page  47.] 

Wagons  from  the  country  clatter 
over  the  stones ;  the  drivers  sing 
cheerful  melodies,  interspersed  with 
shouts  of  caution  to  pedestrians  as 
they  guide  their  restive  horses 
through  the  crowds.  Stout  colored 
women,  with  cackling  hens  dangling 
from  their  brawny  hands,  gravely 
parade  the  long  aisles  ;■  the  fish- 
monger utters  an  apparently  incom- 
prehensible yell,  yet  brings  crowds 
around  him ;  on  his  clean  block  lies 
the  pompano,  the  prince  of  Southern 
waters,  which  an  enthusiastic  ad- 
mirer once  described  as  "  a  just  fish 
made  perfect,"  or  a  "translated  shad." 
Towards  noon  the  clamor  ceases, 
the  bustle  of  traffic  is  over,  and  the 
market-men  and  women  betake 
themselves  to  the  old  cathedral,  in 
whose  shadowed  aisles  they  kneel 
for  momentary  worship. 
4 


escorted  by  pale    and   querulous  invalid   fathers, 
or  by  spruce  young   men,  who  swelter   in   their 
thick  garments,  made  to  be  worn  in  higher  lati- 
tudes.      While    New  York   or   Boston    ladies   sip 
coffee  in   a  market-stall,  groups  of  dreamy-eyed 
negro  girls  surround  them  and  curiously  scan  the 
details  of  their  toilets.      Black  urchins  grin  con- 
fidingly and  solicit  alms  as  the  blond  Northerner 
saunters  by.      Perchance  the 
Bostonian  may  hear  a  silvery 
voice,  whose  owner's  face  is 
buried    in    the    depths    of 
a  sun-bonnet,    exclaim — 
"  There     goes     a     regular 
Yankee !" 

Sailors,  too,  from  the 
ships  anchored  in  the  river, 
promenade  the  long  pas- 
sage-ways; the  accents  of 
twenty  languages  are  heard; 
and  the  childlike,  comical 
French  of  the  negroes  rings 
out    above    the    clamor. 


"  Stout  colored  women,  with  cackling  hens  dangling  from 
their  brawny  hands." 


IV. 


THE     COTTON     TRADE — THE     NEW      ORLEANS     LEVEES. 


c 


OTTON  furnishes  to  New    Orleans    much  of  its  activity  and  the  sinews  of 

its    trade.      It   stamps    a   town,    which   would    otherwise    resemble    some 

yed  but  still  luxurious  European  centre,  with  a  commercial  aspect.     Amer- 


" These  boats,  closely  ranged  in  long  rows  by  the  levee." 
[Page  52.] 


icans  and  Frenchmen  are  alike  inter- 
ested in  the  growth  of  the  crop 
throughout  all  the  great  section  drained 
by  the  Mississippi  and  its  tributaries. 
They  rush  eagerly  to  the  Exchange  to 
read  the  statements  of  sales,  and  rates, 
and  bales  on  hand;  and  both  are  intensely  excited  when  there  is  a  large  arrival 
from  some  unexpected  quarter,  or  when  the  telegraph  informs  them  that  some 
packet  has  sunk,  with  hundreds  of  bales  on  board,  while  toiling  along  the 
currents  of  the  Arkansas  or  Red  rivers. 

In  the  American  quarter,  during  certain  hours  of  the  day,  cotton  is  the  only 
subject  spoken  of;  the  pavements  of  all  the  principal  avenues  in  the  vicinity  of 
the  Exchange  are  crowded  with  smartly- dressed  gentlemen,  who  eagerly  discuss 
crops  and  values,  and  who  have  a  perfect  mania  for  preparing  and  comparing 
the  estimates  at  the  basis  of  all  speculations  in  the  favorite  staple;  with  young 
Englishmen,  whose  mouths  are  filled  with  the  slang  of  the  Liverpool  market; 


GROWTH      OF     THE     COTTON     TRADE.  51 

and  with  the  skippers  of  steamers  from  all  parts  of  the  West  and  South-west, 
each  worshiping  at  the  shrine  of  the  same  god. 

From  high  noon  until  dark  the  planter,  the  factor,  the  speculator,  flit  fever- 
ishly to  and  from  the  portals  of  the  Exchange,  and  nothing  can  be  heard  above 
the  excited  hum  of  their  conversation  except  the  sharp  voice  of  the  clerk  read- 
ing the  latest  telegrams. 

New  Orleans  receives  the  greater  portion  of  the  crop  of  Louisiana 
and  Mississippi,  of  North  Alabama,  of  Tennessee,  of  Arkansas,  and  Florida. 
The  gross  receipts  of  cotton  there  amount  to  about  thirty-three  and  one- 
third  per  cent,  of  the  entire  production  of  the  country.  Despite  the 
abnormal  condition  of  government  and  society  there,  the  natural  tendency 
is  towards  a  rapid  and  continuous  increase  of  cotton  production  in  the 
Gulf  States. 

But  the  honor  of  receiving  the  Texas  crop,  doubled,  as  it  soon  will  be,  as 
the  result  of  increased  immigration,  favoring  climate,  and  cheap  land,  will  be 
sharply  disputed  by  Galveston,  one  of  the  most  ambitious  and  promising  of  the 
Gulf  capitals;  and  the  good  burghers  of  New  Orleans  must  look  to  a  speedy 
completion  of  their  new  railways  if  they  wish  to  cope  successfully  with  the 
wily  and  self-reliant  Texan. 

Judging  from  the  progress  of  cotton -growing  in  the  past,  it  will  be  tremend- 
ous in  future.  In  1^24.-2$  the  cotton  crop  of  the  United  States  was  569,249 
bales;  in  1830-31,  it  ran  up  to  1,038,000  bales;  during '37-38  it  reached  as 
high  as  1,800,000  bales;  and  eleven  years  later  was  2,700,000  bales.  In  1859- 
'60  the  country's  cotton  crop  was  4,669,770  bales;  in  1860-6 1  it  dropped  to 
3,656,000  bales.  Then  came  the  war.  In  the  days  of  slave  labor,  planters  did 
not  make  more  than  a  fraction  of  their  present  per  cent.  They  themselves 
attended  very  little  to  their  crops,  leaving  nearly  everything  to  the  overseers. 
Cotton  raising  is  now  far  more  popular  in  the  Gulf  States  than  it  was  before  the 
war,  although  it  has  still  certain  distressing  drawbacks,  arising  from  the  incom- 
plete organization  of  labor.  The  year  after  the  close  of  the  war,  2,193,000 
bales  were  produced,  showing  that  the  planters  went  to  work  in  earnest  to 
retrieve  their  fallen  fortunes.  From  that  time  forward  labor  became  better 
organized,  and  the  production  went  bravely  on.  In  i866-'67  it  amounted  to 
1,951,000  bales,  of  which  New  Orleans  received  780,000;  in  1867 -'68  to 
2,431,000  bales,  giving  New  Orleans  668,000;  in  1868-69  to  2,260,000, 
841,000  of  which  were  delivered  at  New  Orleans;  in  i869-'70  to  3,114,000, 
and  New  Orleans  received  1,207,000;  in  1870-71  to  4,347,000,  giving  the 
Crescent  City  1,548,000;  and  in  1871-72  to  2,974,000,  more  than  one-third 
of  which  passed  through  New  Orleans.  The  necessity  of  a  rapid  multipli- 
cation of  railroad  and  steamboat  lines  is  shown  by  the  fact  that  more  than 
150,000  bales  of  the  crop  of  i870-'7i  remained  in  the  country,  at  the  close 
of  that  season,  on  account  of  a  lack  of  transportation  facilities.  From  1866 
to  1872,  inclusive,  the  port  of  New  Orleans  received  6,114,000  bales,  or  fully 
one-third  of  the  entire  production  of  the  United  States.  The  receipts  from 
the    Red  River  region  alone   at  New  Orleans   for    1871-72,  by  steamer,  were 


52 


THE     WHARFMEN. 


197,386  bales ;  for  1870-71 
Ouachita  River  sent  to  the 
151,358    in    1870-71. 

Knowing  these  statistics, 
one  can  hardly  wonder  at  the 
vast  masses  of  bales  on  the  levee 
at  the  landings  of  the  steamers, 
nor  at  the  numbers  of  the  boats 
which  daily  arrive,  their  sides 
piled  high  with  cotton.  About 
these  boats,  closely  ranged  in 
long  rows  by  the  levee,  and 
seeming  like  river  monsters 
which  have  crawled  from  the 
ooze  to  take  a  little  sun,  the 
negroes  swarm  in  crowds,  chat- 
ting in  the  broken,  colored 
English  characteristic  of  the 
hang  in  rags  from  their  tawny 
rival  in  perfection  of  form  the 


they    amounted    to    284,313    bales;    and    the 
metropolis    89,084    bales     in     1871-72,    and 


'Not  far  from  the  levee,  there  is   a   police   court,  where   they  especially  delight 
to  lounge." 


"Whenever  there  is  a  lull  in  the  work  they  sink  down  on  the  cotton  bales." 

river-hand.  They  are  clad  in  garments  which 
or  coal  black  limbs.  Their  huge,  naked  chests 
works  of  Praxiteles  and  his  fellows.     Their  arms 

are  almost   constantly 


bent  to  the  task  of  re- 
moving cotton  bales, 
and  carrying  boxes, 
barrels,  bundles  of 
every  conceivable 
shape  and  size ;  but 
whenever  there  is  a  lull 
in  the  work  they  sink 
down  on  the  cotton 
bales,  clinging  to  them 
like  lizards  to  a  sunny 
wall,  and  croon  to 
themselves,  or  crack 
rough  and  good- 
natured  jokes  with  one 
another.  Not  far  from 
the  levee  there  is  a 
police  court,  where 
they  especially  delight 
to  lounge. 

In  1871-72  (the 
commercial  year  ex- 
tends from  September 
to     September)     the 


PLANTERS FACTORS FREEDMEN TRADERS.  53 

value  of  the  cotton  received  at  New  Orleans  was  $94,430,000;  in  iSjo-'ji  it 
was  $101,000,000;  and  in  iS6g-'yo  even  $120,000,000.  The  difference  in 
the  value  of  the  crops  during  that  period  was  very  great.  In  1869-70  cotton 
sold  for  nearly  $100  per  bale,  and  in  1870-71  it  had  depreciated  to  an  average 
of  $65  per  bale.  Until  the  facilities  for  speedy  transportation  have  been  greatly 
increased,  a  glut  of  the  market,  produced  by  a  successful  conduct  of  the  year's 
labor  on  the  majority  of  the  plantations,  will  continue  to  bring  prices  down. 

The  whole  character  of  the  cotton  trade  has  been  gradually  changing  since 
the  war.  Previous  to  that  epoch  a  large  portion  of  the  business  was  done 
directly  by  planters  through  their  merchants;  but  now  that  the  plantations  are 
mainly  worked  on  shares  by  the  freedmen,  the  matter  has  come  into  the  hands 
of  country  traders,  who  give  credits  to  the  laborers  during  the  planting 
seasons,  and  take  their  pay  in  the  products  of  the  crop,  in  harvest  time. 
These  speculators  then  follow  to  market  the  cotton  which  they  have  thus 
accumulated  in  small  lots,  and  look  attentively  after  it  until  it  has  been  delivered 
to  some  responsible  purchaser,  and  they  have  pocketed  the  proceeds. 

They  often  pay  the  planter  and  his  cooperating  freedmen  a  much  higher 
price  for  cotton  than  the  market  quotations  seem  to  warrant ;  but  they  always 
manage  to  retain  a  profit,  rarely  allowing  a  freedman  to  find  that  his  season's  toil 
has  done  more  than  square  his  accounts  with  the  acute  trader  who  has  meantime 
supplied  him  and  his  family  with  provisions,  clothing,  and  such  articles  of  luxury 
as  the  negro's  mind  and  body  crave.  Shortly  after  the  war  there  was  trouble 
between  planters  and  factors ;  and  it  is  not  probable  that  much,  if  any,  business 
will  hereafter  be  transacted  by  the  latter  directly  with  the  planter,  though  upon 
the  arrival  of  the  crop  in  New  Orleans  the  cotton  factor  becomes  the  chief 
authority.  Business  is  largely  done  between  buyer  and  seller  on  the  basis  of  a 
confidence  which  seems  to  the  casual  observer  rather  reckless,  but  which  custom 
has  made  perfectly  safe. 

The  Cotton  Exchange  of  New  Orleans  sprang  into  existence  in  1870,  and 
merchants  and  planters  were  alike  surprised  that  they  had  not  thought  its  advan- 
tages necessary  before.  It  now  has  three  hundred  members,  and  expends  thirty 
thousand  dollars  annually  in  procuring  the  latest  commercial  intelligence,  and 
maintaining  a  suite  of  rooms  where  the  buyer  and  seller  may  meet,  and  which 
shall  be  a  central  bureau  of  news.  The  first  president  of  the  Exchange  was  the 
well-known  E.  H.  Summers,  of  Hilliard,  Summers  &  Co.,  of  New  Orleans;  the 
second  and  present  one  is  Mr.  John  Phelps,  one  of  the [  principal  merchants  of 
the  city.*  The  boards  of  the  Exchange  are  carefully  and  thoroughly  edited,  and 
are  always  surrounded  by  a  throng  of  speculators,  as  well  as  by  the  more  staid 
and  important  of  the  local  merchants.  During  the  busy  season,  the  labor  at  the 
Exchange,  and  in  the  establishments  of  all  the  prominent  merchants  and  factors, 
is    almost    incessant. 

*  The  writer  takes  this  occasion  to  acknowledge  his  indebtedness  to  Secretary  Hester  of  the 
Cotton  Exchange  of  New  Orleans,  and  to  Mr.  Parker  of  the  Picayune,  for  many  interesting 
details  in  this  connection;  to  Hon.  Charles  Gayarre  for  access  to  historical  portraits;  and  to 
Collector  Casey  and  his  able  deputy,  Mr.  Champlin,  for  reference  to  official  statistics. 


54  THE  COTTON  EXCHANGE MANUFACTURES. 

In  the  months  between  January  and  May,  when  the  season  is  at  its  height, 
clerks  and  patrons  work  literally  night  and  day ;  so  that  when  the  most  exhaust- 
ing period  of  the  year  arrives,  finding  themselves  thoroughly  overworked,  they 
leave  the  sweltering  lowlands,  and  fly  to  the  North  for  rest  and  cool  refuge. 
New  Orleans  is  accused  of  a  lack  of  energy,  but  her  cotton  merchants  are  more 
energetic  than  the  mass  of  Northern  traders  and  speculators,  working,  as  they  do, 
with  feverish  impulse  early  and  late.  One  well-known  cotton  factor,  whose 
transactions  amount  to  nearly  $12,000,000  yearly,  gets  to  his  desk,  during  the 
season,  long  before  daylight, — and  that,  in  the  climate  of  the  Gulf  States,  comes 
wonderfully  early. 

The  railroad  development  of  the  South  since  the  war  has  metamorphosed  the 
whole  cotton  trade  of  New  Orleans.  Cotton  which  once  arrived  in  market  in 
May  now  reaches  the  factor  during  the  preceding  December  or  January.  The 
Jackson  and  Mobile  roads  did  much  to  effect  this  great  change,  and  when 
rail  communication  with  Texas  is  secured,  it  will  bring  with  it  another  marked 
difference  in  the  same  direction. 

The  sugar  interest  once  left  the  most  money  in  New  Orleans;  now  cotton 
is  the  main  stay.  It  is  estimated  that  each  bale  which  passes  through  the 
market  leaves  about  seven  dollars  and  fifty  cents.  Most  of  the  business  with 
England  is  done  by  cable,  and  the  telegraph  bills  of  many  prominent  firms 
are  enormous.  The  Board  of  Arbitration  and  Board  of  Appeals  of  the  Exchange 
make  all  decisions,  and  have  power  to  expel  any  unruly  member. 

The  Louisiana  capitalists  have  given  some  attention  to  the  manufacture  of 
cotton,  and  the  factories  which  have  already  been  established  are  clearing  from 
eighteen  to  twenty-five  per  cent,  per  annum.  There  are  two  of  these  factories 
in  New  Orleans,  each  of  which  consumes  about  one  thousand  bales  yearly; 
a  third  is  located  at  Beauregard,  and  a  fourth  in  the  penitentiary  at  Baton 
Rouge.  The  consumption  by  all  the  Southern  cotton  mills,  during  the  three 
years  closing  with  1872  amounted  to  two  hundred  and  ninety-one  thousand 
bales,  and  is  increasing  at  a  rapid  rate.  Each  new  railway  connection  enlarges 
the  city's  claims  as  a  cotton  mart.  The  Jackson  Railroad,  during  the  com- 
mercial year  1871—72,  brought  into  it  forty  thousand  bales,  thus  adding  about 
four  million  dollars  to  the  trade. 

When  the  levees  are  crowded  with  the  busy  negroes,  unloading  cotton 
from  the  steamboats,  the  apparent  confusion  is  enough  to  turn  a  stranger's 
head;  yet  the  order  is  perfect.  Each  of  the  steamers  has  its  special  stall,  into 
which  it  swings  with  grace  and  precision,  to  the  music  of  a  tolling  bell  and  an 
occasional  hoarse  scream  from  the  whistle ;  and  the  instant  the  cables  are  made 
fast  and  the  gangways  swung  down,  the  "roustabouts"  are  on  board,  and  busily 
wheeling  the  variously  branded  bales  to  the  spaces  allotted  them  on  the  wharves. 

The  negroes  who  man  the  boats  running  up  and  down  the  Mississippi  are  not 
at  all  concerned  in  the  discharging  of  cargoes,  being  relieved  from  that  duty 
by  the  regular  wharfmen.  There  is  a  rush  upon  the  pile  of  bales  fifty-feet 
high  on  the  capacious  lower  deck  of  a  Greenville  and  Vicksburg,  a  Red  River, 
or  a  Ouachita  packet,  and  the  monument  to  the  industry  of  a  dozen  planters 


DISCHARGING      CARGOES. 


55 


1  The  cotton  thieves. 


vanishes  as  if  by  magic.  Myriads  of  little  flags,  each  ornamented  with  different 
devices,  flutter  from  various  points  along  the  wharves;  and  as  the  blacks 
wheel  the  cotton  past  the  "tally-man"  standing  near  the  steamer's  gangways, 
he  notes  the  mark  on  each  bale,  and  in  a  loud  voice  calls  out  to  him  who 
is  wheeling  it  the 
name  of  the  sign 
on  the  flag  under  \SJ^3lPll 
which  it  is  to  rest  £ji 
until  sold  and  re-  jsj 
moved.  While  the  JeS 
bales  remain  on  the 
levees,  the  cotton 
thieves  now  and  £ 
then  steal  a  pound  ^ 
or  two  of  the  prec- 
ious staple. 

This  army  of 
"roustabouts"  is  an 
ebony-breasted, 
tough-fisted,  bul- 
let-headed, toiling, 
awkward  mass ;  but 

it  does  wonders  at  work.  It  is  generally  good-humored,  even  when  it  grum- 
bles; is  prodigal  of  rude,  cheerful  talk  and  raillery;  has  no  secrets  or  jealousies; 
is  helpful,  sympathetic,  and  familiar.  It  leaps  to  its  work  with  a  kind  of  con- 
centrated effort,  and,  as  soon  as  the  task  is  done,  relapses  into  its  favorite 
condition  of  slouch. 

Neither  the  sharp  voices  of  the  skippers,  nor  the  harsh  orders  of  the  masters  of 

the  gangs,  nor  the  cheery 
and  mirth-provoking  res- 
ponses of  the  help,  mingled 
with  the  sibilations  of  es- 
caping steam,  the  ringing 
of  countless  bells,  and  the 
moving  and  rumbling  of 
drays,  carts  and  steam-cars 
can  drown  or  smother  the 
jocund  notes  of  the  negro's 
song.  His  arms  and  limbs 
and  head  keep  time  to  the 
harmony,  as  he  trundles 
the  heavy  bale  along  the 
planks. 

When  he  pauses  from 
his  work,  you  may  see  his 


\       V 

"There  is  the  old  apple  and  cake  woman. 


[Page  56.  J 


56 


SMALL     MERCHANTS. 


dusky  wife  or  daughter,  in  a  long,  closely-fitting,  trim  calico  gown,  and  a 
starched  gingham  sun-bonnet,  giving  him  his  dinner  from  a  large  tin  pail ;  or 
you  may  find  him  patronizing  one  of  the  grimy  old  dames,  each  of  whom 
looks  wicked  enough  to  be  a  Voudou  Queen,  who  are  always  seated  at  quiet 
corners  with  a  basket  of  coarse  but  well-prepared  food.  Small  merchants 
thrive  along  the  levee.  There  is  the  old  apple  and  cake  woman,  black  and 
fifty,  blundering  about  the  wharf's  edge ;  there  is  the  antiquated  and  moss- 
grown  old  man  who  cowers  all  day  beside  a  little  cart  filled  with  cans  of  ice- 
cream; there  is  the  Sicilian  fruit- seller,  almost  as  dark  visaged  as  a  negro; 
there  is  the  coffee  and  sausage  man,  toward  whom,  many  a  time  daily,  black 
and  toil-worn  hands  are  eagerly  outstretched ;    and  bordering   on   Canal  street, 

all  along  the  walks  leading  from 
the  wharf,  are  little  booths  filled 
with  negroes  in  the  supreme  stages 
of  shabbiness,  who  feast  on  chicken 
and  mysterious  compounds  of 
vegetables,  and  drink  alarming 
draughts  of  "  whiskey  at  five  cents 
a  glass."  The  sailor  on  the  Mis- 
sissippi is  much  like  his  white 
brother  of  more  stormy  seas,  who 
drinks  up  his  wages,  gets  penitent, 
confesses  his  poverty,  and  begs 
again  for  work. 

At  high  water,  the  juvenile 
population  of  New  Orleans  perches 
on  the  beams  of  the  wharves,  and 
enjoys  a  little  quiet  fishing.  For 
two  or  three  miles  down  the 
river,  from  the  foot  of  Canal  street, 
the  levees  are  encumbered  with 
goods  of  every  conceivable  des- 
cription. Then  the  landings  cease, 
and,  almost  level  with  the  bank  on  which  you  walk,  flows  the  grand,  impetuous 
stream  which  has  sometimes  swept  all  before  it  on  the  lowlands  where  the 
fair  Louisiana  capital  lies,  and  transformed  the  whole  section  between  Lake 
Pontchartrain   and  the   present   channel   into   an   eddying    sea. 

Up  the  river,  commerce  of  the  heavy  and  substantial  order  has  monopolized 
the  space,  and  you  may  note  in  a  morning  the  arrival  of  a  hundred  thousand 
bushels  of  grain,  on  a  single  one  of  the  capacious  tow-boats  of  the  Mississippi 
Valley  Transportation  Company.  Merchants  even  boast  that  the  port  can  supply, 
to  outgoing  ships,  that  quantity  daily  from  the  West;  and  that  the  lack  of 
transportation  facilities  often  causes  an  accumulation  of  three  hundred  thousand 
bushels  in  the  New  Orleans  storehouses.  Up  and  down  the  levees  run  the  branch 
lines  of  the  Jackson,  the  Louisiana  and  Texas,  and  the  New  Orleans,  Mobile  and 


"  The  Sicilian  fruit-seller." 


NIGHT      ON     THE      LEVEES. 


57 


"At  high  water,  the  juvenile  population  perches  on  the  beams  of  the  wharves, 
and  enjoys  a    little  quiet  fishing."      fPage  56.] 


Texas  railways,  and  teams  drive  recklessly  on  the  same  tracks  on  which  incoming 
trains  are  drawn  by  rapidly  moving  locomotives.  The  freight  depots,  the  recep- 
tion sheds  and  the  warehouses  are  crammed  with  jostling,  sweating,  shouting, 
black  and  white  humanity ;  and,  in  the  huge  granite  Custom- House,  even  politics 
has  to  give  way, 
from  time  to  time, 
before  the  tor- 
rents of  business. 
At  night  a  great 
silence  falls  on 
the  levee.  Only 
the  footsteps  of 
the  watchmen, 
or  of  the  polite, 
but  consequen- 
tial negro  police- 
man, are  heard 
on  the  well-worn 
planks.  Now  and 
then  an  eye  of 
fire,  the  lamp 
of  an  incoming 

steamer,  peers  out  of  the  obscurity  shrouding  the  river,  or  glides  athwart  the 
moonlight,  and  three  hoarse  screams  announce  an  arrival.  Along  the  shore, 
a  hundred  lights  twinkle  in  the  water,  and  turn  the  commonest  surroundings  into 

enchantment.  There  is  little  sign  of  life  from  any  of 
the  steamers  at  the  docks,  though  here  and  there  a 
drunken  river-hand  blunders  along  the  wharves 
singing  some  dialect  catch;  but  with  early  sun-peep 
comes  once  more  the  roar,  the  rush,   the  rattle ! 

The  coastwise  trade  is  one  of  the  important 
elements  of  the  commerce  of  New  Orleans.  Of  the 
total  tonnage  entered  and  cleared  from  that  port 
during  the  fiscal  year  1871-72,  fifty-four  per  cent, 
or  1,226,000  tons,  belonged  to  this  trade,  representing 
something  like  $125,000,000;  while  the  foreign  trade 
was  only  $109,000,000  for  the  same  period.  During 
the  commercial  year  ending  September  30,  1872, 
two  thousand  five  hundred  and  nine  steamboats, 
comprising  a  tonnage  of  3,500,000  tons  burthen, 
arrived  at  the  port.  The  value  of  the  principal 
articles  brought  in  by  these  boats  was  $160,000,000, 
the  up-river  cargoes  amounting  to  about  $90,000,000. 
It   is,   therefore,   fair   to   estimate    the    net  value    of 

"The  P0lite,^t:=quential  negro       ^    commerce    at    nearly     $400,000,000     per      annum. 


58  THE     COMMERCE     OF     NEW     ORLEANS. 

Now  let  us  take  the  actual  figures  of  the  commerce  of-  the  Gulf  for  one 
year:  that  from  September,    1871,  to  September,    1872. 

Coastwise  trade $135,000,000 

Galveston   trade 25,000,000 

Mobile  trade 24,000,000 

Exports   from   New   Orleans 90,800,000 

Imports   to   New   Orleans 18,700,000 

Cuban   trade                       150,000,000 

Porto   Rico 25,000,000 

Mexico 35,000,000 

This,  exclusive  of  the  Darien  and  Central  American  trade,  now  so  rapidly 
increasing,  makes  a  grand  total  of  more  than  five  hundred  millions  of  dollars.* 

*  The  collection  district,  of  which  New  Orleans  is  the  chief  port,  embraces  all  the  shores, 
inlets,  and  waters  within  the  State  of  Louisiana  east  of  the  Atchafalaya,  not  including  the 
waters  of  the  Teche,  of  the  Ohio  river,  or  the  several  rivers  and  creeks  emptying  into  it,  or 
of  the  Mississippi  or  any  of  its  tributaries  except  those  within  the  State  of  Mississippi.  The 
district  extends  on  the  coast  from  the  western  boundary  of  Mississippi,  on  Lake  Borgne,  to  the 
Atchafalaya ;  and  the  ports  of  delivery,  to  which  merchandise  can  be  shipped  under  transporta- 
tion bond,  are  as  follows :  Bayou  St.  John  and  Lake  Port,  in  Louisiana ;  Memphis,  Nashville, 
Chattanooga  and  Knoxville,  in  Tennessee ;  Hickman  and  Louisville,  in  Kentucky ;  Tuscumbia, 
in  Alabama ;  Cincinnati,  in  Ohio ;  Madison,  New  Albany  and  Evansville,  in  Indiana ;  Cairo, 
Alton,  Quincy,  Peoria  and  Galena,  in  Illinois ;  Dubuque,  Burlington  and  Keokuk,  in  Iowa; 
Hannibal  and  St.  Louis,  in  Missouri,  and  Leavenworth,  in  Kansas.  The  shipment  of  merchan- 
dise, under  transportation  bond,  has  increased  steadily  from  $1,736,981  in  1866  to  $5,502,427  in 
1872;  the  value  of  merchandise  imported,  from  $10,878,365  to  $20,006,363;  and  domestic 
exports,  from  $89,002,141  to  $95,970,592,  in  the  same  period.  The  total  value  of  the  mer- 
chandise imported  during  those  years  is  $102,305,014;  the  total  of  domestic  exports  amounted 
to  $608,871,013,  and  the  whole  amount  of  revenue  collected,  to  $35,140,906. 

The  receipts  from  customs  at  New  Orleans  for  1872  were  very  much  diminished  by  the  large 
shipments  of  goods  in  bond  to  the  interior  cities  of  Memphis,  Nashville,  Louisville,  Cincinnati, 
Cairo,  St.  Louis,  Chicago,  etc.,  the  duties  on  which  were  collected  at  those  ports  respectively. 
From  1866  to  1872  inclusive,  the  movement  of  the  port  included  2,852  foreign  vessels,  with  a 
tonnage  of  1,547,747  tons,  and  1,773  American  ships,  with  a  tonnage  of  1,100,492.  The  rev- 
enue receipts  at  New  Orleans  have  been  largely  diminished  by  the  removal  of  the  duties  on 
coffee — the  importations  of  that  article  during  the  seven  years  following  1866  amounting  to 
155,953,213  pounds,  valued  at  $16,511,602.  The  magnitude  of  the  trade  of  the  port  may  also 
be  well  illustrated  by  showing  the  importations  of  sugar  and  railroad  iron  for  the  same  time. 
Of  the  former  article  there  were  imported  263,918,978  pounds,  worth  $14,531,960,  and  of  the 
latter  480,043  tons,  valued  at  $15,299,642. 

It  will  be  seen  that  the  imports  are  small  in  quantity  as  compared  with  the  exports  when 
the  cotton  is  counted  in — the  imports  amounting  to  only  about  one-seventh  of  the  exports;  but 
this  ratio  will  be  much  reduced  in  time,  as  New  Orleans  becomes  a  more  economical  port. 
Five  steamship  lines  now  make  the  city  their  point  of  departure.  Three  of  these,  the  Liverpool 
Southern,  the  Mississippi  and  Dominion,  and  the  State  Line  Steamship  Company,  communi- 
cate directly  with  Liverpool,  while  other  lines  are  projected. 


V. 


THE  CANALS  AND  THE  LAKE THE  AMERICAN  QUARTER. 

NEW  ORLEANS  is  built  on  land  from  two  to  four  feet  below  the  level 
of  the  Mississippi  river  at  high  water  mark.  It  fronts  on  a  great  bend  in 
the  stream  in  the  form  of  a  semicircle,  whence  it  takes  its  appellation  of  the 
"Crescent  City,"  and  stretches  back  to  the  borders  of  Lake  Pontchartrain,  which 
lies  several  feet  below  the  level  of  the 
Mississippi,  and  has  an  outlet  on  the 
Gulf  of  Mexico.  The  rain-fall,  the 
sewerage  of  the  city,  and  the  surplus 
water  from  the  river,  are  drained  into 
the  canals  which  traverse  New 
Orleans,  and  are  thence  carried  into 
the  lake.  The  two  principal  canals, 
known  as  the  Old  and  New  Basins. 
are  navigable ;  steamers  of  consider- 
able size  run  through  them  and  the 
lake  to  the  Gulf,  and  thence  along 
the  Southern  Atlantic  coast;  and 
schooners  and  barks,  laden  with  lum- 
ber and  produce,  are  towed  in  and 
out  by  mules.  The  city  is  divided 
into  drainage  districts,  in  each  of 
which  large  pumping  machines  ^are 
constantly  worked  to  keep  down  the 
encroaching  water.  Were  it  not 
for  the  canals  and  the  drainage  system,  the  low-lying  city  would,  after  a 
heavy  rain,  be  partially  submerged.  A  fine  levee  extends  for  four  and  a-half 
miles  along  the  front  of  Lake  Pontchartrain,  making  a  grand  driveway ;  and  as  a 
complement  to  this  improvement,  it  is  expected  that  in  a  few  years  the  cypress 
swamps  will  be  filled  up,  and  the  lake  front  will  be  studded  with  mansions. 
The  building  of  this  levee'  was  an  imperative  necessity,  the  action  of  the  lake 
making  the  perfecting  of  the  city's  present  system  of  drainage  impossible  other- 


The  St.  Charles  Hotel  — New  Orleans.     [Page  61.] 


On  Sundays  the  shell  road  leading  northward  from  Canal  street  past  the 
Metairie  and  Oakland  Parks,  by  the  side  of  the  New  Basin,  is  crowded  with 
teams,  and  the  restaurants,  half  hidden  by  foliage,  echo  to  boisterous  merri- 
ment.     But  on  a  week  day  it  is  almost  deserted.      Schooners  on  the  canal  glide 


6o 


ON      LAKE     PONTCHARTRAIN. 


The  New  Basin.     [Page  59.] 


lazily  along;  ragged  negro  boys  sit  on  the  banks,  sleepily  fishing;  while  the 
intense  green  of  the  leaves  is  beautifully  reflected  from  the  water.  Arrived  near 
the  lake,  you  catch  a  view  of  dark  water  in  the  canal  in  the  foreground,  with  a 
gayly-painted  sail-boat   lying  close  to  the  bank;    an  ornamental   gateway  just 

beyond;  a  flock  of  goats  browsing  at 
the  roadside;  and  afar  off,  a  white 
light-house  standing  lonely  on  a  narrow 
point  of  land.  You  may  step  into  a 
sail-boat  at  the  lake,  and  let  a  brown, 
barefooted  Creole  fisherman  sail  you 
down  to  the  pier  where  the  railroad 
from  New  Orleans  terminates;  then 
back  again,  up  the  Bayou  St.  John, 
until  he  lands  you  near  the  walls  of 
the  "old  Spanish  fort"  There  you 
may  find  a  summer-house,  an  orchard,  and  a  rose-garden.  From  the  balcony 
you  can  see  a  long  pier  running  into  the  lake  ;  the  sun's  gold  on  the  rippling 
water;  the  oranges  in  the  trees  below;  the  group  of  sailors  tugging  at  the 
cable  of  their  schooner;  the  pretty  cluster  of  cottages  near  the  levee's  end; 
the  cannon,  old  and  dismounted,  lying  half-buried  under  the  grasses ;  the 
wealth  of  peach-blossoms  in  the  bent  tree  near  the  parapet;  and  a  bevy  of  bare- 
legged children  playing  about  their  mother,  as  she  sits  on  the  sward,  cutting 
rose-stems,   and  twisting  blossoms  into  bouquets. 

As  evening  deepens,  you  sail  home,  and,  in  the  dining-room  of  the  restaurant 
near  the  canal,  look  out  upon  the  passing  barges  and  boats  gliding  noiselessly 
townward ;  hear  the  shouts  of  festive  parties  as  they  wander  on  the  levee,  or 
along  the  cypress-girt  shore;  hear  the  boatmen  singing  catches;  or  watch  a 
blood-red  moon  as  it  rises  slowly,  and  casts  an  enchanted  light  over  the  burnished 
surface  of  the  water-way. 

A  promenade  on  Canal  street  is  quite  as  picturesque  as  any  in  the  French 
quarter.  There  is  the  negro  boot-black  sitting  in  the  sun,  with  his  own  splay- 
feet  on  his  blacking-block;  and  there  are  the  bouquet- sellers,  black  and  white, 
ranged  at  convenient  corners,  with  baskets  filled  with  breast  knots  of  violets,  and 
a  world  of  rose-buds,  camelias,  and  other  rich  blossoms:  The  newsboy  cries  his 
wares,  vociferous  as 
his  brother  of  Go- 
tham. The  "  roust- 
abouts" from  the 
levee,  clad  in  striped 
trowsers  and  flannel 
shirts,  and  in  coats 
and  hats  which  they 
seem  to  have  slept 
in    for    a    century, 

hasten    homeward    tO  The  old  Spanish  Fort. 


NEW     ORLEANS      LADIES- 


'THE      GARDEN      CITY. 


6l 


dinner,  with  their  cotton-hooks  clenched  in  their  brawny  hands.  The  ropers 
for  gambling-houses — one  of  the  curses  of  New  Orleans — haunt  each  con- 
spicuous corner,  and  impudently  scan  passers-by. 

From  twelve  to  two  the  American  ladies  monopolize  Canal  street  Hund- 
reds of  lovely  brunettes  may  be  seen,  in  carriages,  in  cars,  in  couples  with 
mamma,  or  accompanied  by  the   tall,  _-     ___,= 

dark,  thin  Southern  youth,  attired 
in  black  broadcloth,  slouch  hat,  and 
irreproachable  morning  gloves.  The 
confectioners'  shops  are  crowded  with 
dainty  little  women,  who  have  the 
Italian  rage  for  confetti,  and  the 
sugared  cakes  of  the  pastry-cook 
vanish  like  morning  dew.  The 
matinees  at  the  American  theatres, 
as  at  the  French,  begin  at  noon;  and 
at  three  or  half-past  three,  twice  a 
week,  the  tide  of  beauty  floods  Canal, 
St.  Charles,  Carondelet,  Rampart,  and 
other  streets.  At  evening,  Canal 
street  is  very  quiet,  and  hardly  seems 

the  main  thoroughfare  Of  a  great  City.  The  University  °f  Louisiana -New  Orleans.     [Page  62.] 

The  American  quarter  of  New  Orleans  is  superior  to  the  French  in  width 
of  avenue,  in  beauty  of  garden  and  foliage;  but  to-day  many  streets  there 
are  grass-grown,  and  filled  with  ruts  and  hollows.  In  that  section,  not  inaptly 
designated  the  "  Garden  City,"  there  are  many  spacious  houses  surrounded  by 
gardens,  parks  and  orchards ;  orange-trees  grow  in  the  yards,  and  roses  clamber 
in  at  the  windows.  The  homes  of  well-to-do  Americans,  who  have  been  able 
to   keep    about   them    some  appearance    of  comfort  since    the   war,  are  found 

mostly  on  Louis- 
iana and  Napoleon 
avenues  and  on 
Prytania,  Plaque- 
mine,  Chestnut, 
Camp,  Jena,  Cadiz, 
Valence,  Bordeaux, 
and  St.  Charles 
streets.  Along  St. 
Charles  street,  near 
Canal,  are  the  fa- 
mous St.  Charles 
Hotel;  the  Acad- 
emy of  Music,  and 
the  St.  Charles 
Theatre,  both  welJ 


62 


PUBLIC      BUILDINGS. 


appointed  theatrical  edifices ;  and  the  Masonic,  City,  and  Exposition  Hails. 
Opposite  the  City  Hall — one  of  the  noblest  public  buildings  in  New  Orleans, 
built  of  granite  and  white  marble,  in  Grecian  Ionic  style — is  Lafayette 
Square.      On    its   south-western  side  is  the  First  Presbyterian  Church ;   and  at 

its  southern  extremity  the  Odd  Fellows'  Hall, 
where  the  famous  McEnery  Legislature  held  its 
sessions.  On  Common  street,  one  of  the  business 
thoroughfares  of  the  town,  is  the  University  of 
Louisiana.  The  city  is  making  its  most  rapid 
growth  in  the  direction  of  Carrollton,  a  pretty 
suburb,  filled  with  pleasant  homes,  and  within 
three-quarters  of  an  hour's  ride  of  Canal  street. 

Canal  street  is  bordered  by  shops  of  no  mean 
pretensions,  and  by  many  handsome  residences; 
it  boasts  of  Christ  Church,  the  Varieties  Theatre, 
the  noted  restaurant  of  Moreau,  the  statue  of 
Henry  Clay,  a  handsome  fountain,  and  the  new 
Custom- House.  The  buildings  are  not  crowded 
together,  as  in  New  York  and  Paris;  they  are 
Christ  Church -New  Orleans.  usually  two  or  three  stories  high,  and  along  the  first 

story  runs  a  porch  which  serves  as  a  balcony  to  those  dwelling  above,  and  as 
protection  from  sun  and  rain  to  promenaders  below.  The  banks,  insurance  offi- 
ces, and  wholesale  stores  fronting  on  Canal  street  are  elegant  and  modern, 
an  improvement  in  the  general  tone  of  business  architecture  having  taken  place 
since  the  war.  Under  the  regime  of  slavery,  little  or  no  attention  was  paid  to 
fine    buildings;    exterior    decoration,  -   --^-        Ji  -  .^^iCl:^-- 

save  that  which  the  magnificent 
foliage  of  the  country  gave,  was  en- 
tirely disregarded.  Now,  however, 
the  citizens  begin  to  take  pride  in 
their  public  edifices. 

The  bugbear  of  yellow  fever  has, 
for  many  years,  been  a  drawback  to 
the  prosperity  of  New  Orleans.  The 
stories  told  of  its  fearful  ravages  during 
some  of  its  visitations  are  startling- 
but  there  is  hope  that  the  complete 
and  thorough  draining  of  the  city  will 
prevent  the  repetition  of  such  scenes 
and  consequent  panics  in  future.  The 
inhabitants  who  remain  in  the  city 
throughout  the  summer  are,  in  ordi- 
nary seasons,  as  healthy  a  people  as 
can  be  found  in  the  United  States. 
Although  a   lifetime  spent  in  the  soft 


YELLOW     FEVER— THE      CHARITY     HOSPITAL. 


63 


climate  of  Louisiana  may  render  an  organism  somewhat  more  languid  and 
effeminate  than  that  of  the  Northerner,  there  are  few  of  the  wretched  chronic 
complaints,  terminating  in  lingering  illness  and  painful  death,  which  result 
from     the    racking    conflict    of    extremes   in   the    New   England    climate. 


The  Charity  Hospital — New  Orleans. 

Many  Louisianians  disbelieve  in  the  efficacy  of  quarantine  against  the  yellow 
fever.  They  say  that,  during  seventy  years,  from  1796  to  1870,  they  had  quar- 
antine nineteen  times,  and  in  each  of  those  nineteen  years  the  dread  fever  at 
least  showed  its  ugly  face.  The  war  quarantine, .  they  assert,  failed  every  year 
of  the  four  that  it  was  in  operation.  The  Charity  Hospital  has  received  cases  of 
yellow  fever  annually  for  the  last  fifty  years.  Only  in  two  cases,  however,  where 
the  proper  quarantine  precautions  had  been  taken,  had  the  disease  assumed  the 
proportions  of  a  general  plague.  The  general  impression  is  that  the  fever  will 
certainly  carry  off  unacclimated  persons;  but  physicians  in  the  hospitals  assert 
that  there  has  been  no  evidence  of  the  transmission  of  the  fever  in  hospital 
wards  to  unacclimated  people;  and  as  they  have  watched  cases  for  weeks  after 
exposure,  their  testimony  should  be  considered  valuable.  Previous  to  the  war, 
no  proper  attention  had  been  paid  to  drainage  and  cleanliness  of  streets  in  New 
Orleans;  and  it  is  the  opinion  of  many 
good  authorities  that  a  careful  exam- 
ining of  all  vessels  arriving  from  foreign 
ports,  and  in  town  a  sanitary  police 
of  the  most  rigorous  character,  will  soon 
make  the  fever  a  rare  and  not  a  very 
dangerous  visitor. 

The  Charity  Hospital  is  one  of  the 
noblest  buildings  in  the  city,  and  the 
people  of  New  Orleans  have  good 
reason  to  be  proud  of  it.  Dating  from 
the  earliest  foundation  of  the  city,  it  has 
never  closed  its  doors  save  when  acci- 

The  old  Maison  de  Sante —  New  Orleans      [Page  64. J 


64 


HOSPITALS PROTESTANT     CHURCHES. 


dent  has  compelled  it  to  do  so  temporarily.  From  the  time  when  the  Ursuline 
nuns  took  charge  of  it  under  Bienville  until  now  it  has  been  one  of  the  most 
beneficent  charities  in  the  country.  No  question  of  race,  nationality,  religion, 
sex  or  character  hinders  from  admission  a  single  applicant  for  repose  and  heal- 
ing within  the  walls;  and 
the  best  medical  talent  is 
placed  at  the  disposition 
of  the  poorest  and  meanest 
of  citizens.  The  Asylum 
of  St.  Elizabeth,  and  the 
male  and  female  orphan 
asylums,  are  also  note- 
worthy charities. 

The  Maison  de  Sante, 
long  one  of  the  most  noted 
infirmaries  of  New  Orleans, 

The  United  States  Marine  Hospital  —  New  Orleans.  IS    nOW    deserted     and    like 

the  United  States  Marine  Hospital,  which  has  not  been  used  since  i860,  is 
rapidly  falling  into  decay.  During  the  war  the  fine  United  States  Hos- 
pital, which  once  stood  at  MacDonough's,  on  the  river  opposite  New  Orleans, 
was  destroyed. 

The  Protestant  churches  in  the  American  quarter  are  good  specimens  of 
modern  church  architecture.  The  oldest  of  the  Episcopal  organizations,  dating 
back  to  1806,  is  Christ  Church,  on  Canal  street,  founded  by  Bishop  Chase. 
This  church  was  the  germ  of  Protestantism  in  the  South-west.  The  present 
edifice  is  the  third  erected  by  the  society.      The  fashionable  Episcopal  churches 


Trinity  Church  —  New  Orleans. 


St.  Paul's  Church  —  New  Orleans. 


THE      CATHOLIC     CHURCHES. 


65 


are  considered  to  be  Trinity  and  St.  Paul's.  Annunciation  Church  is  a  fine 
edifice.  The  McGhee  Church,  of  which  Rev.  Dr.  Tudor  is  pastor,  is  the  prin- 
cipal of  the  Methodist  Episcopal  churches  South.  The  Northern  post-bellum 
settlers  are  mainly  Congregational  or  Methodist,  and  have  gathered  at  the  First 


Congregational  Church, 
and  at  the  Methodist 
Episcopal  Ames  Chapel. 
The  First  Presbyterian 
Church  Society  long  en- 
joyed the  spiritual  guid- 
ance of  the  eloquent  Dr. 
Palmer,  a  divine  of  na- 
tional reputation.  The 
principal  Baptist  society 
assembles  at  the  Coli- 
seum Place  Church. 
There  are  great  numbers 
of  colored  church  organ- 
izations, many  of  which 
are  in  a  flourishing  con- 


dition, having  been 
largely  aided  by  North- 
ern missions.  As  there 
are  one  hundred  and 
sixteen  churches  in  New 
Orleans,  the  visitor  can 
hardly  hope  to  peer  into 
them  all;  but  on  Baronne 
street  he  may  steal  for  a 
moment  into  the  shade 
of  the  old  Jesuit  Church, 
and,  entering  the  dimly- 
lighted  nave,  see  the 
black- robed  girls  at  the 
confessional,  and  the 
richly-dressed  women 


First  Presbyterian  Church  —  New  Orleans 

making  their  rounds  before  the  chapels  and  kneeling,  prayer-books  in 
hand,  beside  the  market-woman  and  the  serving  girl.  The  Jesuit  Church, 
St.    Augustine's,    St.    Joseph's,    St.    Patrick's,    and    the    Mortuary   Chapel,    are 


PAT 
The  Catholic  Churches  of  New  Orleans. 

among  the  best  of  the  Catholic  religious  structures.     St.  Patrick's  has  a  tower 

190   feet  high,   modeled    after  that  of  the  famous    minster  at  York,  England. 

The    city  is   not    rich    in    architecture.     After    the    National    Capitol,    the 

Custom- House  is  considered  the  largest  public  building  in  the  country.     It  has 

5 


66 


THE     CUSTOM-HOUSE  —  THE      BRANCH      MINT 


a  front  of  334  feet  on  Canal  street,  and  nearly  the  same  on  the  levee.  It  is 
built  entirely  of  granite  from  Massachusetts.  Begun  in  1848,  little  has  been 
done  since  the  war  to  complete  it.  As  the  seat  of  the  United  States 
courts,  and  of  the  exciting  political  conventions  which  have  been  so  intimately 


The  Custom-House  —  New  Orleans. 

connected  with  the  present  political  condition  of  Louisiana,  the  Custom-House 
attracts  an  interest  which  its  architecture  certainly  could  never  excite.  The 
building  still  lacks  the  roof  contemplated  in  the  original  plan.  When  General 
Butler  was  military  commander  of  New  Orleans  he  proposed  to  erect  a  tem- 
porary roof,  but  his  recall  came  before  the  work  was  begun. 

The  Ionic  building  at  the  corner  of  Esplanade  and  New  Levee  streets,  once 
used  as  a  United  States  branch  mint,  is  noted  as  the  place  of  execution  of  Mum- 
ford,  who  tore  down  the  flag  which  the  Federal  forces  had  just  raised  on  the  roof 
when  in  1862  the  city  was  first  occupied  by  the  Northern  forces.  Mumford  was 
hung,  by  General  Butler's  order,  from  a  flag-staff  projecting  from  one  of  the 
windows  under  the  front  portico  of  the  main  building. 


■',  Jo.  ^JlUJl^S'lHJJi  H  H 

"  :,ir  .■.*!  I  iHSTPai 


I  ft W'     '  ' '  Alfli      il 


The  United  States  Branch  Mint — New  Orleans. 


VI. 

ON     THE      MISSISSIPPI     RIVER — THE     LEVEE      SYSTEM — RAILROADS. 
THE     FORT      ST.     PHILIP     CANAL. 

THE  banks  of  the  Mississippi,  within  the  State  of  Louisiana,  are  lovely,  the 
richness  of  the  foliage  and  the  luxuriance  of  the  vegetation  redeeming 
them  from  the  charge  of  monotony  which  might  otherwise  be  urged.  Here 
and  there  a  town,  as  in  the  case  of  Plaquemine,  has  been  compelled  to  recede 
before  the  encroachments  of  the  river. 

The  people  of  the  State  have  shown  rare  pertinacity  in  maintaining  the  levee 
system.  Like  the  Dutch  in  Holland,  they  doggedly  assert  their  right  to  the 
lowlands  in  which  they  live,  always  braving  inundation.  They  have  built,  and 
endeavor  to  maintain  in  repair,  more  than  1,500  miles,  or  51,000,000  cubic  feet 
of  levees  within  the  State  limits.  Their  State  engineer  corps  is  always  at  work 
along  the  banks  of  the '  Mississippi,  above  and  below  Red  River,  on  the  Red 
River  itself,  on  the  Lafourche,  the  Atchafalaya,  the  Black  and  Ouachita,  and  on 
numerous  important  bayous. 

The  work  of  levee  building  has  been  pressed  forward  even  when  the  Com- 
monwealth has  been  prostrated  by  a  hundred  evils.  Detailed  surveys  are  con- 
stantly necessary  to  insure  the  State  against  inundation.  The  cost  value  of  the 
present  system  is  estimated  at  about  $17,000,000,  and  it  is  asserted  that  the 
future  expenditure  of  a  similar  sum  will  be  necessary  to  complete  and  perfect  it. 

Ten  years  before  the  war,  when  Louisiana  was  in  her  most  prosperous  condi- 
tion, she  possessed  1,200  miles  of  levees,  and  the  police  juries  of  the  several 
parishes  compelled  a  strict  maintenance  of  them  by  "inspectors  of  sections." 
Of  course,  during  the  war,  millions  of  cubic  feet  of  levees  were  destroyed  by 
neglect,  and  for  military  purposes ;  and  that  the  State,  in  her  impoverished 
condition,  should  have  been  able  to  rebuild  the  old,  and  add  new  levees  in  so 
short  a  time,  speaks  volumes  for  her  energy  and  industry, — qualities  which 
find  a  thorough  representative  in  General  Jeff  Thompson,  the  present  State 
Engineer. 

The  Louisiana  people  claim  that  the  general  government  should  now  take  the 
building  of  levees  along  the  Mississippi  into  its  own  hands,  and  their  reasoning  to 
prove  it  is  ingenious.  They  say,  for  instance,  that  the  tonnage  of  the  great  river 
amounts  during  a  given  year  to  1,694,000  tons.  They  then  claim  that  the 
transit  of  steamboats  gives,  by  causing  waves,  an  annual  blow,  equal  to  the 
whole  tonnage  of  the  commerce  of  the  river,  against  each  portion  or  point  of  the 
levees,  or  the  banks  on  which  the  levees  are  erected ;  and  that  this  blow  is 
delivered  at   the    average  rate    of  about  six  miles  an    hour,  a  force  equal  to 


68' 


THE     LEVEE      SYSTEM DOWN     THE      RIVER. 


15,000,000  tons; — a  force  expended  by  the  commerce  of  the  whole  Mississippi 
basin  upon  each  lineal  foot  in  the  755  miles  of  Louisiana  levees  upon  the  river! 
On  these  grounds  they  object  to  paying  all  the  expenses  of  levee  building  in 
their  own  State ;  and  they  are  supported  by  able  scientists. 

The  United  States  certainly  is 
the  only  power  in  America  which  can 
ever  control  the  Mississippi,  and  pre- 
vent occasional  terrible  overflows; 
and  it  is  its  bounden  duty  to  do  it. 
By  day  and  night,  the  journey 
down  river  in  the  State  of  Louisiana 
is  alike  beautiful,  impressive,  exhila- 
rating. But  when  a  moonless  night 
settles  down  upon  the  stream,  and 
you  float  away  into  an  apparent 
ocean  on  the  back  of  the  white 
Leviathan  whose  throbbing  sides, 
seem  so  tireless,  the  effect  is  sol- 
emnly  grand. 

Sometimes  the  boat  stops  at  a 
coaling  station,  and  tons  of  coal  are 
laboriously  transferred  from  barges  to 
the  steamer.  An  army  of  negroes 
shovel  the  glistening  nuggets  into 
rude  hand-barrows,  which  another 
army,  formed  into  a  procession,  car- 
ries to  the  furnaces. 

I  went  down  from  Vicksburg  on 
one  of  the  larger  and  finer  of  the 
steamers;  and  the  journey  was  a  per- 
petual succession  of  novel  episodes. 
At  one  point,  when  I  supposed  we 
were  comfortably  holding  our  way  in 
the  channel,  a  torch- light  flared  up,  and  showed  us  nearing  a  scraggy  bank. 
The  thin,  long  prOw  of  the  boat  ran  upon  the  land.  Gangways  were 
lowered;  planks  were  run  out  from  the  boat's  side  to  the  bank;  forty 
negroes  sprang  from  some*  mysterious  recess  below,  and  huddled  before 
the   capstan. 

The  shower  of  harmless  sparks  from  the  torches  cast  momentary  red  gleams 
over  the  rude  but  kindly  black  faces.  A  sharp-voiced  white  man,  whom  I 
learned  afterwards  to  call  the  "Wasp,"  because  he  always  flew  nervously  about 
stinging  the  sprawling  negroes  into  activity,  thrust  himself  among  the  laborers. 
Twenty  stings  from  his  voice,  and  the  dusky  forms  plunged  into  the  darkness 
beyond  the  gangways.  Then  other  torches  were  placed  upon  the  bank — 
lighting  up  long  wood-piles. 


"Sometimes  the  boat  stops  at  a  coaling  station. 


"wooding    up." 


69 


The  Wasp  flitted  restlessly  from  shore  to  deck,  from  deck  to  shore,  while  the 
negroes  attacked  the  piles,  and,  each  taking  half  a  dozen  sticks,  hurried  to  the 
deck  with  them.  Presently  there  was  an  endless  procession  of  black  forms 
from  the  landing  to  the  boat  and  back  through  the  flickering  light,  to  the 
tune  of  loud  adjurations  from  the  Wasp.  Now  and  then  the  chain  of  laborers 
broke    into    a   rude    chant,   beginning   with    a   prolonged    shout,    such    as 

"Oh!   I  los'  my  money  dar!" 

and  followed  by  a  gurgling  laugh,  as  if  the  singers  were  amused  at  the  sound  of 
their  own  voices.  When  any  of  the  darkies  stumbled  or  lagged,  the  Wasp, 
generally  kind  and  well- 
disposed  towards  the  ne- 
groes, despite  his  rough 
ways,  broke  into  appeal, 
threat,  and  entreaty,  cry- 
ing out  raspingly  and  with, 
oaths,  "  You,  Reuben !" 
"You,  Black  Hawk!" 
"Come  on  thar,  you 
Washington !  ain't  you 
going  to  hear  me!"  Now 
and  then  he  would  run 
among  the  negroes,  urging 
them  into  such  activity 
that  a  whole  pile  would 
vanish  as  if  swallowed  by 
an  earthquake.  In  two 
hours  and  a-half  sixty 
cords  of  wood  were  trans- 
ferred from  the  bank  to 
the  boat,  and  the  Wasp, 
calling  the  palpitating 
wood-carriers  around  him, 
thus  addressed  them: 
"  Now,  you  boys,  listen. 
You,  Black  Hawk,  do  you 
hear?  you  and  these  three,  first  watch!  You,  Reuben,  and  these  three,  second 
watch  !"  etc.  Then  the  torches  were  dipped  in  the  river,  and  the  great  white 
boat  once  more  wheeled  around  into  the  channel. 

On  the  shores  we  could  dimly  discern  huge  trees  half  fallen  into  the  stream, 
and  stumps  and  roots  and  vines  peeping  up  from  the  dark  waters.  We  could 
hear  the  tug-boats  groaning  and  sighing  as  they  dragged  along  heavily  laden 
barges ;  and  once  the  light  of  a  conflagration  miles  away  cast  a  strange,  dim 
light  over  the  current.  Now  and  then  the  boat,  whirling  around,  made  for  the 
bank,  and  the  light  of  our  torches  disclosed  a  ragged  negro  holding  a  mail-bag. 


"The  Wasp." 


"JO  A      LOUISIANA      SWAMP. 

Up  the  swinging  gangway  clambered  one  of  our  deck  hands;    the  mails  were 
exchanged  ;  the  lights  went  out  once  more. 

So  on,  and  ever  on,  a  cool  breeze  blowing  from  the  perfumed  banks.     Now 
we  could  see  the  lights  from  some  little  settlement  near  a  bayou  emptying  into 


"Some  tract  of  hopelessly  Irreclaimable,  grotesque  water  wilderness." 

the  stream ;  now,  the  eye  of  some  steamer,  and  hear  the  songs  of  the  deck- 
hands as  she  passed  us.  Now  we  moved  cautiously,  taking  soundings,  as  we 
entered  some  inlet  or  detour  of  the  river ;  and  now  paused  near  some  great 
swamp  land — some  tract  of  hopelessly  irreclaimable,  grotesque  water  wilderness, 
where  abound  all  kinds  of  noisesome  reptiles,  birds  and  insects. 

One  should  see  such  a  swamp  in  October,  when  the  Indian  summer  haze 
floats  and  shimmers  lazily  above  the  brownish-gray  of  the  water;  when  a 
delicious  magic  in  the  atmosphere  transforms  the  masses  of  trees  and  the 
tangled  vines  and  creepers  into  semblances  of  ruined  walls  and  tapestries.  But 
at  any  season  you  see  towering  white,  cypresses,  shooting  their  ghostly  trunks  far 
above  the  surrounding  trees ;  or,-  half  rotten  at  their  bases,  fallen  into  the  water ; 
the  palmettoes  growing  in  little  clumps  along  the  borders  of  treacherous  knolls, 
where  the  earth  seemed  firm,  but  where  you  could  not  hope  with  safety  to  rest 
your  feet ;  the  long  festoons  of  dead  Spanish  moss  hanging  from  the  high  boughs 
of  the  red  cypress,  which  refuses  to  nourish  the  pretty  parasite ;  and  the  great 
cypress  knees,  now  white,  now  brown,  looming  up  through  the  warm  haze,  and 
peeping  from  nooks  where  the  water  is  transparent,  seeming  like  veins  in  a 
quarry  riven  by  lightning  strokes. 

Vista  after  vista  of  cypress-bordered  avenues,  with  long  lapses  of  water  filling 
them,  and  little  islands  of  mud  and  slime,  thinly  coated  with  a  deceptive  foliage, 
stretch  before  your  vision ;  a  yellowish  ray,  flashing  across  the  surface  of  the 
water,  shows  you  where  an  alligator  had  shot  forward  to  salute  his  friend  or 


THE     RIVER     PANORAMA.  Jl 

attack  his  enemy ;  and  a  strange  mass  hanging  from  some  remotest  bough,  if 
narrowly  inspected,  proves  an  eagle's  nest,  fashioned  with  a  proper  care  for 
defense. 

You  see  the  white  crane  standing  at  some  tree  root,  sullenly  contemplating 
the  yielding  mass  of  decaying  logs  and  falling  vines ;  and  the  owl  now  and  then 
cries  from  a  high  perch.  The  quaint  grossbeak,  the  ugly  heron,  the  dirty-black 
buzzard,  the  hideous  water-goose,  with  his  featherless  body  and  satiric  head, 
start  up  from  their  nooks  as  you  enter ;  the  water  moccasin  slides  warily  into 
the  slime ;  and  if  you  see  a  sudden  movement  in  the  centre  of  a  leaden-colored 
mass,  with  a  flash  or  two  of  white  in  it,  you  will  do  well  to  beware,  for  half  a 
dozen  alligators  may  show  themselves  at  home  there.  You  may  come  upon 
some  monarch-tree,  prostrate  and  decayed  within  from  end  to  end.  Entering 
it,  and  tapping  carefully  as  you  proceed  to  frighten  away  lurking  snakes,  you 
will  find  that  you  can  walk  through  without  stooping,  even  though  you  are  of 
generous  height. 

As  far  as  the  eye  can  reach  you  will  see  hundreds  of  ruined  trees,  great 
stretches  of  water,  forbidding  avenues  which  seem  to  lead  to  the  bottomless  pit, 
vistas  as  endless  as  hasheesh  visions ;  and  the  cries  of  strange  birds,  and  the  bel- 
lowings  of  the  alligator,  will  be  the  only  sounds  from  life.  You  will  be  glad  to 
steal  back  to  the  pure  sunlight  and  the  open  lowland,  to  the  river  and  the 
odors  of  many  flowers — to  the  ripple  of  the  sad-colored  current,  and  the  cheery 
songs  of  the  boatmen. 

Some  evening,  just  as  sunset  is  upon  the  green  land  and  the  broad  stream, 
you  stand  high  up  in  the  pilot-house,  as  you  float  into  a  channel  between  low- 
lying  islands,  clad  even  to  the  water's  edge  with  delicate  shrubs  whose  forms  are 
minutely  reflected  in  the  water.  You  may  almost  believe  yourself  removed  out 
of  the  sphere  of  worldly  care,  and  sailing  to  some  haven  of  profoundest  peace. 

So  restfully  will  the  tender  glory  of  the  rose  and  amethyst  of  the  sunset  come 
to  you;  so  softly  will  the  perfume  of  the  jessamines  salute  your  senses;  so  gently 
will  avenue  after  avenue  of  verdurous  banks,  laved  by  tranquil  waters  and  extend- 
ing beyond  the  reach  of  your  vision,  open  before  you  ;  so  quietly  will  the  wave 
take  from  the  horizon  the  benison  of  the  sun's  dying  fires ;  so  artfully  will  the 
perfect  purple — the  final  promise  of  a  future  dawn — peep  up  from  the  islets' 
rims  ere  it  disappears,  that  you  will  be  charmed  into  the  same  serene  content 
which  nature  around  you  manifests.  From  some  distant  village  is  borne  on  the 
breeze  the  music  of  an  evening  bell ;  from  some  plantation- grounds,  or  a  grove 
of  lofty  trees,  comes  the  burden  of  a  negro  hymn,  or  a  jolly  song  of  love  and 
adventure. 

Down  below,  the  firemen  labor  at  the  seven  great  furnaces,  and  throw  into 
them  cords  on  cords  of  wood,  tons  on  tons  of  coal ;  the  negroes  on  the  watch 
scrub  the  decks,  or  trundle  cotton  bales  from  one  side  of  the  boat  to  the  other, 
or  they  lie  listlessly  by  the  low  rails  of  the  prow,  blinking  and  shuffling  and  laugh- 
ing with  their  own  rude  grace.  Above,  the  magic  perfume  from  the  thickets 
fillled  with  blossoms  is  always  drifting,  and  the  long  lines  of  green  islets  bathed 
by  the  giant  stream,  pass  by  in  rapid  panorama. 


7* 


TYPES      ON      A      RIVER     STEAMER. 


You  notice  that  some  little  fiend  of  a  black  boy,  clad  in  an  old  woolen  cap,  a 
flannel  shirt  whose  long  flaps  hang  over  his  ragged  and  time-honored  trowsers, 
and  shoes  whose  heels  are  so  trodden  in  that  when  he  walks  his  motion  seems 
to  rock  the  steamer,  will,  when  his  comrade  is  not  watching,  steal  some  little  arti- 
cle which  said  comrade  can  ill  afford  to  lose  ;  whereupon  comrade,  in  due  time 
discovering  the  loss,  will  end  by  complaining  of  the  suspected  boy  to  the  Wasp ; 
then  you  see  the  Wasp  come  buzzing  and  stinging  and  swearing  along  the  broad 
decks,  and  calling  George  Washington  to  a  certain  post  where  he  is  to  face  him. 
Perhaps  the  Wasp  will  say:  "George  Washington,  Jack  says  you  stole  his  belt;" 
and  then  will  sting  and  buzz  and  swear ;  whereupon  George  Washington,  mop- 
ping his  black  face  with  the  flap  of  his  red  flannel  over-garment,  will  say  hastily, 
in  one  indignant  sibilation:  "Deed  to  God,  hope  I  die,  sah — no  sah  !"  Perhaps 
then  the  Wasp  will  make   George  Washington  hold  up  his  hand,  and,  looking 


him  earnestly  in  the  face, 
will  say,  "George  Wash- 
ington, are  you  going  to 
tell  me  a  lie?"  with  a 
buzz  and  a  sting  and  a 
swear. 

Whereupon  George 
Washington  will  again  and 
defiantly  sibilate:  "If  dat 
nigger  say  dat,  he  lied.  I 
do'  know  nuffin  about  his 
belt  nohow.  Mus'  a  los' 
it  woodin-up  las'  night.  I 
did  n't  tetch  it ;  "  but  after 
various    hand- raisings   will 


The  monument  on  the  Chalmette 
battle-field. 


finally  end  by  rendering 
up  the  belt,  and  retiring 
to  the  shade  of  a  cotton 
bale,  followed  by  the 
laughter  of  his  com- 
rades. 

You  come  to  a  planta- 
tion landing  where  some 
restive  steers  are  to  be 
taken  aboard,  and  notice 
the  surprising  manner  in 
which  those  playful  crea- 
tures toss  about  the 
negroes  who  wish  to  lead 
them  on,  until  one  or  two 
agile  fellows,  catching  the  beasts  by  the  tails,  and  as  many  more  holding  their 
horns,  manage  to  make  them  walk  the  narrowest  planks. 

Or  you  come  to  some  landing  where  a  smart-looking  young  negro  man 
comes  on  board  with  a  quadroon  wife  ;  and  you  notice  a  hurried  look  of  surprise 
on  some  of  the  old  men's  faces  as  the  couple  are  shown  a  state-room,  or  as 
they  promenade  unconcernedly. 

Or  a  group  of  chattering  French  planters,  with  ruddy  complexions  and  coal 
black  eyes  and  hair,  arrive,  and  the  village  priest,  a  fat,  stalwart  old  boy  in  a 
white  choker  and  a  shovel  hat,  accompanies  them;  or  perhaps  a  lean,  gray-haired 
man,  with  a  strongly  marked  dialect  and  a  certain  contemptuous  way  of  talking 
of  modern  things,  tells  you  that  he  remembers  the  first  steamboat  but  three  that 
ever  ran  upon  the  Mississippi  river,  and  hints  that  "  times  were  better  then  than 
now.     That  was  a  right  smart  o'  years  ago." 

Descending  the  river  from  New  Orleans,  you  go  slowly  down  a  muddy- 
colored  but  broad  and  strong  current,  between  low  and  seemingly  unstable 
banks.  You  pass  the  Chalmette  battle-field,  where  Andrew  Jackson  won  his 
victory  over  the  English,  and  where  Monument  Cemetery,  the  burial  place  of 


THE     MOUTHS     OF     THE     MISSISSIPPI.  73 

many  thousand  soldiers,  killed  in  the  late  civil  war,  is  located.  The  monument 
from  which  the  cemetery  takes  its  name  was  erected  in  1856,  to  commemorate 
General  Jackson's  good  fight. 

The  fears  that  the  levees  along  the  Mississippi  would  "not  be  able  always  to 
resist  the  great  body  of  water  bearing  and  wearing  upon  them  have  several 
times  been  realized.  Among  the  most  disastrous  instances  of  the  "crevasse"  is 
that  of  May,  18 16,  when  the  river  broke  through,  nine  miles  above  New  Orleans, 
destroying  numbers  of  plantations,  and  inundating  the  back  part  of  the  city. 
Gov.  Claiborne  adopted  the  expedient  of  sinking  a  vessel  in  the  breach,  and 
saved  the  town.  In  1844  the  river  did  much  damage  along  the  levee  at  New 
Orleans;  and  the  inundations  of  1868  and  1871  were  severe  lessons  of  the 
necessity  of  continually  strengthening  the  works. 

Within  fifty  or  sixty  miles  of  the  river's  mouths,  the  banks  become  too  low 
for  cultivation ;  you  leave  the  great  sugar  plantations  behind,  and  the  river 
broadens,  until,  on  reaching  the  "  Head  of  the  Passes,"  it  separates  into  several 
streams,  one  of  which  in  turn  divides  again  a  few  miles  from  its  separation  from 
the  main  river.  Beginning  at  the  north  and  east,  these  passes,  as  they  are 
called,  are  named  respectively  "Pass  a  l'Outre,"  "North-east  Pass,"  the  "South 
Pass,"  and  "South-west  Pass."  Across  the  mouths  of  these  passes  bars  of  mud  are 
formed,  deposited  by  the  river,  which  there  meeting  the  salt  and  consequently 
heavier  water  of  the  gulf,  runs  over  the  top  of  it,  and,  being  partially  checked, 
the  mud  is  strained  through  the  salt  water,  and  sinks  at  once  to  the  bottom. 

This  separation  of  the  fresh  from  the  salt  water  is  maintained  in  a  remarkable 
degree.  When  the  river  is  high,  the  river  water  runs  far  out  to  sea,  and  has 
been  seen  at  fifteen  miles  from  the  passes,  with  as  sharply  defined  a  line  between 
them  as  that  between  oil  and  water.  This  is  also  true  with  reference  to  the 
upper  and  lower  strata.  Sometimes,  when  a  steamer  is  running  through  a  dense 
pea-soup  colored  water  on  top,  the  paddle-wheels  will  displace  it  sufficiently  to 
enable  one  to  see  clear  gulf  water  rushing  up  to  fill  the  displacement.  The 
flood  tide  runs  up  underneath  the  river  water  for  a  long  distance,  and,  at  extra- 
ordinary high  tides,  is  distinctly  visible  as  far  as  New  Orleans,  one  hundred  and 
ten  miles  above.*     The  bars  change  their  depth  constantly. 

When  the  river  is  high,  and  consequently  brings  down  most  mud,  the  depth 
of  the  deposit  increases  with  great  rapidity ;  while  in  a  low  stage  of  the  river 
the  accumulation  is  slight.  The  bars  are  subject  to  another  and  great  change, 
believed  to  be  peculiar  to  the  Mississippi ;  that  is,  the  formation  of  "  mud 
lumps."  These  mud  lumps  are  cone-shaped  elevations  of  the  bottom,  often 
thrown  up  in  a  few  hours,  so  that  although  the  pilot  may  find  ample  depth 
for  the  largest  ship  on  one  day,  on  the  next  he  may  be  aground  with  one 
of  a  much  lighter  draught. 

Sometimes  the  lumps  disappear  as  quickly  as  formed ;  at  others  they  spread, 
show  themselves  above  the  water,  and  gradually  grow  into  islands.     It  is  sup- 

*  For  these  and  many  other  interesting  details,  the  writer  gratefully  acknowledges  his  obliga- 
tions to  Major  C.  W.  Howell,  Captain  of  United  States  Engineers,  and  to  Captain  Frank  Barr, 
United  States  Revenue  Marine. 


74 


IMPROVEMENT     OF     THE     RIVER     "PASSES. 


posed  that  this  is  the  manner  in  which  the  long,  narrow  banks  on  either  side  of 
the  "passes"  have  been  formed.  These  cone-shaped  lumps  of  mud  are  believed 
to  be  started  by  the  action  of  carburetted  hydrogen  gas  formed  by  the  decay  of 
vegetable  matter  contained  in  the  river  deposits,  the  substance  of  the  bar  being 
loosened  by  the  action  of  the  gas  and  forced  upward  until  the  lump  makes  its 
appearance  above  the  water ;  when,  becoming  dry,  and  being  continually  fed 
by  the  forces  from  below,  it  gradually  gains  consistency,  and  forms  another  link 
in  the  delta  chain,  extending  into  the  waters  of  the  Gulf. 

The  attention  of  the  United  States  Government  to  the  necessity  of  improve- 
ment at  the  mouths  of  the  Mississippi  was  first  attracted  in  earnest  in  1837,  when 
an  extended  and  elaborate  survey  of  the  passes  and  mouths  was  made  by  Captain 
Talcot,  of  the  Engineer  Corps.  To  save  the  commerce  of  New  Orleans  it  was 
necessary  to  deepen  the  channel ;  and  the  plan  of  dredging  with  buckets  was 
carried  into  effect  as  far  as  a  slight  appropriation  permitted.  No  farther  work 
was  then  undertaken  until  1852,  when  $75,000  was  set  aside  for  it;  and*  a  num- 
ber of  processes  for  deepening—- such  as  stirring  up  the  river  bottom  with  suit- 
able machinery,  and  the  establishment  of  parallel  jetties,  five  miles  in  length,  at 
the  mouth  of  the  South-west  Pass — were  tried. 

By  1853  a  depth  of  eighteen  feet  of  water  had  been  obtained  in  the  South- 
west Pass  by  stirring  up  the  river  bottom;  but  in  1856  it  was  found  that  no  trace 
of  the  deepening  remained.  In  that  year  the  sum  of  $300,000  was  appropri- 
ated for  opening  and  keeping  open,  by  contract,  ship  channels  through  the  bars 
at  the  mouths  of  the  South-west  Pass. 

Contractors  began  work,  but  unless  they  labored  incessantly,  they  could  not 
keep  the  channels  open;  and  they  retired  discomfited.  The  plan  of  dragging  har- 
rows and  scrapers  seaward  along  the  bottom  of  the  channel  was  adopted,  thus- 
aiding  the  river-flood  to  carry  the  stirred-up  matter  to  deep  water;  and  a  depth 
of  eighteen  feet  was  maintained  upon  the  bar  for  one  year  at  a  cost  of  $60,000. 
Other  efforts,  in  1866  and  1867,  were  equally  costly  and  of  small  avail;  and  in 

1 868,  the  "  Essayons,"  a  steam 


Light-house  —  South-west  Pass.     [Page  75.] 


dredge-boat,  constructed  by 
the  Atlantic  Works,  of  Boston, 
was  employed  upon  the  bar 
at  Pass  a  l'Outre.  The  plan 
of  this  boat,  which  had  been 
recommended  by  General 
McAllister,  was  a  powerful 
steamer  with  a  cutting  pro- 
peller, which  could  be  lowered 
into  the  surface  of  the  mud, 
where  its  rapid  revolutions 
would  effect  the  necessary 
"stirring- up."  So  far  as  her 
draught  permits,  the  "Essay- 
ons "   has    been    a    complete 


THE     BALIZE- 


PILOT     TOWN. 


75 


success;  and  another  steamer,  whose  cutting  propeller  can  work  at  greater  depth, 
and  which  has  been  named  "McAllister,"  is  now  engaged  upon  the  work.  The 
ma.in  labor  with  these  new  boats  has  been  done  at  the  South-west  Pass,  which 
has  become  the  principal  entrance  to  the  Mississippi,  and  there  the  United  States 
Government  is  erecting  a  light-house  on  iron  piles,  as  the  marshes  offer  but  an 
insecure  foundation.  The  improvements  at  the  river's  mouth,  like  those  in 
the  Red  River,  Tone's  Bayou,  the  Tangipahoa  River,  the  harbor  of  Galveston, 
and  the  Mississippi  forts,  as  well  as  those  on  the  lakes  in  the  rear  of  New  Orleans, 

are  all  under  the  direction  of 
Major  C.  N.  Howell,  of  the 
Engineer  Department.  Pass 
a  1' Outre  is  generally  consid- 
ered by  best  authorities  the 
natural  channel  for  eastward- 
bound  and  returning  ships. 
With  its  bar  opened,  none 
such  would,  it  is  affirmed, 
ever  go  to  South-west  Pass, 
for  the  reason  that  they  might 
save  several  hours  coming 
in.  This  pass,  properly 
opened,  can  accommodate  three  times  the  number  of 
ships  which  now  annually  enter  the  Mississippi. 
The  effect  on  the  commerce  of  New  Orleans  of  the 
bar- formations  at  the  river's  mouths  is  depressing.  They  cause  burdensome  taxes 
on  the  earnings  of  ships.  In  1870  the  value  of  imports  at  New  Orleans  amounted 
to  only  one-seventh  of  the  exports;  but  if  the  port  were  made  as  economical  as 
that  of  New  York,  by  removing  all  obstacles  to  free  entrance  and  exit,  the 
imports  would  soon  nearly  equal  the  exports.  The  Government  is  at  present 
expending  about  $650,000  annually  on  the  necessary  river  and  harbor  improve- 
ments in  Louisiana  and  Texas.  Twice  that  amount  might  be  judiciously  invested 
every  year.  The  work  on  the  channel  at  the  Mississippi's  outlet  must  evidently 
be  perpetual,  unless  the  plan  of  a  canal  is  adopted. 

"The  Balize,"  now  a  little  collection  of  houses  at  the  North-east  Pass,  was 
a  famous  place  in  its  day — was,  indeed,  the  port  of  New  Orleans;  and 
vessels  were  often  detained  there  for  weeks  on  the  great  bar,  which  had 
been  labored  upon  to  but  little  advantage  before  the  cession  of  Louisiana 
to  the  United  States.  The  extensive  French  military  and  naval  establish- 
ments at  the  Balize  were  utterly  destroyed  by  the  great  hurricanes  of 
September,  1740.  Now-a-days,  the  venerable  port  is  almost  desolate;  a 
few  damp  and  discouraged  fishermen  linger  sadly  among  the  wrecks  of 
departed  greatness.  "Pilot  Town,"  at  the  South-west  Pass,  is  interesting 
and  ambitious.  The  pilots  and  fishermen  are  delightful  types,  and  are 
nearly  all  worthy  seamen  and  good  navigators.  At  "Pass  a  l'Outr.e  "  and 
"  South-west  Pass  "  the  Government  maintains  a  "  boarding-station  "  for  protec- 


j6  RAILROADS     IN     LOUISIANA. 

tion  of  the  revenue,  and  an  inspector  is  sent  up  to  the  port  of  New  Orleans  with 
each  incoming  vessel. 

Steaming  back  to  the  Louisiana  capital  on  one  of  the  inward-bound  vessels, 
leaving  behind  you  the  low-lying  banks ;  the  queer  towns  at  the  mouths  of  the 
passes,  with  their  foundations  beneath  the  water;  the  long  lines  of  pelicans 
sailing  disconsolately  about  the  current ;  the  porpoises  disporting  above  the  bars, 
and  the  alligators  sullenly  supine  on  the  sand,  you  will  land  into  the  rush  and 
whir  of  the  great  commerce  "on  the  levee."  If  it  be  evening,  you  will  hear  the 
hoarse  whistles  of  a  dozen  steamers,  as  they  back  into  midstream,  the  negroes  on 
their  decks  scrambling  among  the  freight  and  singing  rude  songs,  while  the 
loud  cries  of  the  captains  are  heard  above  the  noise  of  escaping  steam. 

One  of  the  most  pressing  needs  of  Louisiana  is  an  increase  of  railway  lines. 
The  New  Orleans,  Mobile  and  Texas  road  has  done  much  for  the  commerce  of 
the  State,  and  is,  undoubtedly,  one  of  the  best  constructed  lines  in  the  country. 
It  drains  extensive  sections  of  Mississippi  and  Alabama  toward  New  Orleans. 
The  extension  of  this  route  to  Houston  in  Texas,  and  the  building  of  a  branch 
from  Vermilionville  to  Shreveport,  will  do  much  for  the  development  of  the 
commonwealth.  The  trade  between  New  Orleans  and  Shreveport,  which  is 
really  immense,  was  much  restricted  for  many  years  by  the  difficulty  of  navigat- 
ing the  Red  river,  whose  tortuous  water-ways  have  latterly  been  considerably 
improved.  The  projected  "Louisiana  Central"  railroad,  located  along  the  route 
of  the  Red  river  for  about  200  miles,  passing  through  Alexandria  and  Natchi- 
toches, will  make  Shreveport  within  twelve  hours  of  New  Orleans.  The  journey 
formerly  occupied  three  or  four  days.  Morgan's  "Louisiana  and  Texas"  rail- 
road extends  from  New  Orleans  to  Brashear  City  on  Berwick's  Bay,  where  it 
communicates  with  a  fleet  of  first-class  iron  steamers  running  to  Texas  ports. 
The  branch  of  this  road  from  Brashear  City  to  Vermilionville,  graded  years  ago, 
might  now  be  completed  to  advantage. 

The  New  Orleans,  Jackson  and  Great  Northern  railroad  gives  a  valuable  con- 
nection with  the  North,  via  Jackson,  in  Mississippi.  A  recent  enterprise  is  the 
New  Orleans  and  North-eastern  road,  which  is  to  cross  Lake  Pontchartrain  on  a 
trestle-work,  supported  on  piles,  and  opening  up  a  delightful  location  for  sub- 
urban residences  beyond  the  lake,  is  to  push  on  into  the  iron  and  coal  regions 
of  Alabama.  The  Illinois  Central  Railroad  Company  has  built  a  line  from 
Jackson,  Tennessee,  to  the  south  bank  of  the  Ohio  river,  opposite  Cairo,  Illinois, 
bringing  New  Orleans  as  near  to  Chicago  by  rail  as  it  is  to  New  York,  and 
creating  an  important  adjunct  to  the  system  for  transportation  from  the  North- 
west to  the  gulf  and  the  ocean.  Railroad  routes  along  the  banks  of  the  Mis- 
sissippi would  give  new  life  to  such  towns  as  Baton  Rouge,  the  old  capital  of 
Louisiana,  129  miles  from  New  Orleans,  and  Natchez  in  Mississippi.  Baton 
Rouge  now  has  no  communication  with  New  Orleans  save  by  steamer.  It  is 
a  lovely  town,  built  on  gently  sloping  banks  crowned  with  picturesque  houses, 
the  ruined  Gothic  State  Capitol,  a  substantial  Penitentiary,  and  the  Asylum  for 
the  Deaf  and  Dumb.  It  is  one  of  the  healthiest  towns  in  the  State,  and  with 
proper  facilities  for  speedy  communication  with  other  towns,  might  be  the  seat 


THE      FORT     ST.      PHILIP     CANAL. 


77 


of  a  flourishing  trade.  Routes  parallel  with  the  river  would  be  speedily 
built  if  New  Orleans  had  better  outlets  and  more  tonnage.  Knowing  this, 
the  enterprising  inhabitants  of  that  city  are  anxious  for  the  Fort  St.  Philip 
canal,  which  shall  render  the  tedious  and  risky  navigation  of  the  passes  at  the 
Mississippi's  mouth  unnecessary. 

The  project  of  the  Fort  St.  Philip  canal  is  not  entirely  due  to  the  sagacity  of 
this  generation.  Forty  years  ago  the  Legislature  of  Louisiana,  at  the  suggestion 
of  a  distinguished  engineer,  memorialized  Congress  on  the  subject  of  a  canal  to 
connect  the  Mississippi  river  with  the  Gulf,  leaving  the  stream  a  few  miles  below 
Fort  St.  Philip  and  entering  the  Gulf  about  four  miles  south  of  the  island  "  Le 
Breton."  Numerous  commercial  conventions  have  endorsed  it  since  that  time. 
It  would  give,  by  means  of  a  system  of  locks,  a  channel  which  would  never  be 
subject  to  the  evils  now  disfiguring  the  passes  at  the  river's  mouth,  and  would 
communicate  directly  with  deep  water.  The  estimated  cost  of  the  work  is  about 
eight  millions  of  dollars.  It  is  a  national  commercial  necessity,  and  should  be 
undertaken  by  the  Government  at  once.  New  Orleans  would  more  than  quad- 
ruple her  transportation  facilities  by  means  of  this  canal,  not  only  with  regard  to 
Liverpool,  Bremen,  Hamburg,  Rotterdam,  Antwerp,  Southampton,  Havre,  and 
Glasgow,  but  to  New  York  and  Philadelphia.  Havana,  Lima,  and  Aspinwall. 


'A  Nickel  for  Daddy. 


VII.      * 

THE     INDUSTRIES     OF     LOUISIANA A     SUGAR      PLANTATION. 

THE  TECHE  COUNTRY. 

THE  main  industries  of  Louisiana  at  the  present  time  are  the  growth  of 
cotton,  the  production  of  sugar,  rice,  and  wheat, —  agriculture  in  general, — 
and  cattle  raising.  The  culture  of  the  soil  certainly  offers  inducements  of  the 
most  astonishing  character,  and  the  immigrant  who  purchases  a  small  tract — 
five  to  ten  acres — of  land  can,  during  the  first  year  of  possession,  make  it 
support  himself  and  his  numerous  family,  and  can  also  raise  cotton  enough  on 
it  to  return  the  purchase  money. 

Vergennes,  in  his  memoir  on  La  Louisiane,  printed  early  in  this  century, 
says:  "I  will  again  repeat  what  I  have  already  many  times  said — that  Louis- 
iana is,  without  doubt,  by  reason  of  the  softness  of  her  climate  and  the  beauty 
of  her  situation,  the  finest  country  in  the  universe.  Every  European  plant,  and 
nearly  all  those  of  America,  can  be  successfully  cultivated  there."  This  was  the 
verdict  of  one  who  had  made  a  careful  survey  of  the  great  province  then  known 
as  Louisiana,  and  especially  the  tract  now  comprised  in  the  lowlands.  Rice, 
an  important  article  of  food,  can  be  raised  on  grounds  which  are  too  low  and 
moist  for  any  other  species  of  valuable  vegetables,  and  in  the  Mississippi  basin, 
rice,  sugar  and  corn  can  be  cultivated  in  close  proximity.  The  fertility  of  the 
sugar  lands  is  proverbial;  and  Louisiana  is  prodigal  of  fruit  of  all  kinds.  With 
but  little  attention  orange  and  fig-trees  prosper  and  bear  splendid  crops ;  apples 
and  peaches  are  produced  in  abundance;  and  grape-bearing  lands  are  to  be 
found  in  all  sections  of  the  State.  Sugar,  cotton,  rice  and  tobacco  might  all 
be  readily  cultivated  on  the  same  farm  in  many  sections. 

The  cultivation  of  rice,  introduced  into  Louisiana  by  Bienville,  at  the  time  of 
the  founding  of  New  Orleans,  may  be  profitably  pursued  in  all  the  "parishes," 
i.  e.,  counties,  on  the  river  and  Gulf  coasts,  and  on  the  high  pine  lands  of  the 
northern  part  of  the  State.  The  rice  raised  on  the  irrigated  lands  below  New 
Orleans,  and  in  the  immediate  proximity  of  the  Gulf,  is  known  as  "lowland  rice;" 
that  raised  elsewhere  as  "upland." 

The  quality  of  the  staple  is  constantly  improving  by  cultivation.  In  i860 
the  rice  crop  of  Louisiana  amounted  to  6,500,000  pounds.  There  is  no  good 
reason  why  it  should  not  now  be  60,000,000.  Barley  and  buckwheat  flourish 
admirably  in  the  .State,  and  the  attention  given  to  the  cultivation  of  wheat  since 
the  close  of  the  war  has  accorded  singularly  gratifying  results.  The  average 
yield  in  the  hill  portion  of  the  State  is  fully  equal  to  that  of  the  Northern  States, 
— about  twelve  bushels  to  the  acre — and  in  the  Red   River  Valley,  where  the 


WHEAT THE     SUGAR-CANE. 


79 


planters  were  compelled  to  devote  much  of  their  old  cotton  land  to  the  pro- 
duction of  wheat,  for  the  sake  of  getting  the  wherewithal  to  live,  the  yield  was 
twenty  bushels  to  the  acre. 

The  wheat  yearly  gains  largely  in  weight,  size  and  color.  It  is  said  that 
wherever  the  cavalry  of  the  United  States  camped  in  Louisiana  during  the  war, 
immense  grain  fields  sprang  up  from  the  seed  scattered  where  horses  were  fed. 
In  the  swamps  of  Assumption  parish  wheat  and  rye  have  been  known  to  yield 
forty  bushels  to  the  acre.  The  wheat  may  be  planted  in  September,  October, 
or  November,  and  reaped  late  in  April  or  early  in  May.  Indian  corn  does  not 
yield  well,  rarely  giving  over  fifteen  bushels  to  the  acre.  Marsh,  Hungarian 
herbs,  and  prairie  grasses  grow  in  abundance  and  make  excellent  hay.  Pastur- 
age is  perennial,  and  in  the  Attakapas  the  grazing  regions  are  superb.  Cotton 
may  be  cultivated  throughout  the  entire  arable  portion  of  the  State. 

The  cultivation  of  the  sugar-cane  in  Louisiana  merits  especial  mention. 
One  of  the  most  remunerative  of  industries  under  the  slave  system,  it  has 
been  for  some  time  languishing  because  of  the  disorganization  of  labor,  and 
because  also  of  the  division  of  large  plantations  into  small  farms.  For  a  whole 
year  before  the  sugar  crop  is  ready  for  the  market,  a  constant  outlay  is  required, 
and  the  small  planters  succeed  but  poorly,  while  the  larger  ones  have  been 
ruined  by  the  war,  and  have  allowed  their  sugar-houses  to  decay,  and  their 
splendid  machinery  to  rust  in  ditches. 

In  175 1,  two  ships  transporting  soldiers  to  Louisiana,  stopped  at  Hispaniola, 
and  the  Jesuits  on  that  island  sent  some  sugar-canes  and  some  negroes,  used  to 
their  cultivation,  to  the  brothers  of  their  order  in  the  new  colony.  The  Jesuits 
at  New  Orleans  undertook  the  culture  of  the  crop,  but  did  not  succeed;  and  it 
was  only  in  1795  that  the  seeds  became  thoroughly  naturalized  in  Louisiana. 

Up  to  1 8 16  the  cultivation  of  the  cane  was  confined  to  the  lower  parishes, 
but  it  is  now  raised  with  reasonable  success  in  many  other  portions  of  the  State. 
From  1828  to  1833,  the  sugar  production  in  the  commonwealth  was  about 
280,000  hogsheads.  The  following  table  will  show  the  amount  of  the  crops  of 
each  year  from  1834  to  1873  inclusive: 


Y  Production, 

'  Hogsheads. 

1834 100,000 

I835 30,000 

1836 70,000 

1837 65,000 

1838 70,000 

1839 115,000 

1840 87,000 

1841 90,oop 

1842 140,000 

1843 100,000 


Year  Production, 

Hogsheads. 

1844 200,000 

1845 186,000 

1846 140,000 

1847 240,000 

1848 220,000 

1849 247,000 

1850 211,000 

185  I 236,000 

1852 321,000 

1853 449,000 


Year  Production, 

Hogsheads. 

1854 346,000 

1855 231,000 

1856 74,000 

1857 279,000 

1858 362,000 

1859 221,000 

i860 228,000 

l86l 459,000 

1 864..  War,      7,000 
1865 15,000 


Year  Production, 

Hogsheads. 

1866 39,000 

1867 37,600 

1868 84,000 

1869 87,000 

1870 144,800 

1871 128,461 

1872 105,000 

1873 90,000 


The  ribbon  cane  planted  in  Louisiana  was  brought  from  Java,  in  a  ship  which 
touched  at  Charleston.     It  was  hardy,  and  was  at  once  adopted  in  all  sections  of 


80  COOPERATION THE     "DELTA." 

the  State.  But  it  is  thought  that  it  has  deteriorated  very  much,  and  an  associa- 
tion recently  sent  a  gentleman  to  the  islands  of  the  Pacific  Ocean  and  to  India 
to  search  for  a  fresh  supply.  He  secured  some  ten  thousand  cuttings,  which 
were  so  long  in  transit  as  to  be  nearly  all  destroyed,  and  parties  in  the  sugar 
interest  are  now  anxious  that  a  government  vessel  should  be  sent  out  to  obtain  a 
new  supply. 

There  were,  at  the  time  of  my  visit  to  Louisiana,  1,224  sugar-houses  in 
operation  in  the  State,  907  of  which  possessed  steam  power.  The  number  of 
large  plantations  is  everywhere  decreasing,  while  small  farms  take  their  place. 

The  cooperative  system,  as  practiced  in  Martinique  and  other  colonies,  has 
been  adopted  to  some  extent  in  the  State.  It  separates  the  production  of  cane 
from  the  manufacture  of  sugar,  the  small  planters  taking  their  carte  to  the  sugar- 
houses  to  be  worked  through  on  shares.  This  is  much  better  than  the  old 
system,  which  made  the  raising  of  sugar  by  free  labor  so  expensive  as  to  be 
almost  impossible.  The  cooperative  system  will,  perhaps,  prevail  very  largely 
ere  long,  many  extensive  planters  giving  it  their  sanction.  In  1871,  there 
was  enough  labor  and  capital  expended  on  the  crop  to  have  brought  it  up  to  a 
quarter  of  a  million  hogsheads. 

The  accumulated  losses  of  the  last  three  years  have  made  the  trade  so 
dubious  that  dozens  of  the  largest  planters  in  the  State  cannot  secure  a  cent  of 
advances.  Plantations  are  deserted ;  owners  are  completely  discouraged.  The 
present  sugar  production  of  this  most  fertile  of  cane- growing  lands  is  only  two 
per  cent,  of  the  whole  production  of  the  world.  The  consumption  of  sugars  in 
the  United  States  for  the  calendar  year  1871  was  663,000  tons,  of  which  eighty- 
five  per  cent,  was  foreign.  The  whole  number  of  acres  now  devoted  to  the 
cultivation  of  sugar  in  Louisiana  is  estimated  at  148,840,  producing  to  the 
acre  about  49,000  pounds  of  cane,  or  1,500  pounds  of  raw  sugar.  To  every 
thousand  pounds  of  sugar  there  is  also  a  yield  of  666  pounds  of  molasses. 

All  the  land  comprised  in  the  section  known  as  the  "  Delta  proper  of  the  Miss- 
issippi River,"  embracing  eighteen  parishes  and  an  area  of  12,000  square  miles, 
is  peculiarly  adapted  to  the  cultivation  of  sugar-cane,  as  well  as  of  cotton,  corn, 
rice,  tobacco,  indigo,  oranges,  lemons  and  figs.  More  than  half  of  the  population 
of  the  State  is  settled  upon  this  delta ;  and  in  1 860,  one  hundred  and  fifty  thou- 
sand slaves  were  held  in  that  section,  and  the  total  estimate  of  taxable  property 
there,  including  the  slaves,  amounted  to  $271,017,667,  more  than  half  of  the 
State's  entire  valuation.  It  is  not  wonderful  that  stagnation  has  fallen  upon 
this  once  prosperous  region,  since,  reckoning  the  slaves  at  the  average  $1,000 
apiece,  by  their  liberation  alone  $150,000,000  of  the  above  valuation  at  once 
vanished  into  thin  air.* 

""  For  fifty  or  sixty  miles  below  New  Orleans,  the  narrow  strip  which  protects 
the  Mississippi  channel  on  either  side  from  the  gulf  is  crowded  with  plantations. 
The  soil  there  is  all  of  recent  alluvial  formation,  and  is,  consequently,  extremely 

*The  census  of  1870  gives  Louisiana  732,731  population,  of  whom  364,210  were  blacks. 
The  population  of  New  Orleans  in  1870  was  nearly  200,000. 


THE      "MAGNOLIA         PLANTATION.  8l 

prolific.  This  section  may,  without  the  least  exaggeration,  be  called  "  of  the 
best  land  in  the  world.."  The  rivers  and  bayous  furnish  fish  and  oysters  of 
finest  flavor ;  the  earth  brings  forth  fruit  and  vegetables  in  tropical  abundance ; 
all  the  conditions  of  life  are  easy ;  and,  in  addition,  there  is  the  profitable  culture 
of  sugar  and  rice. 

The  negroes  themselves  are  making  money  rapidly  in  this  section,  and  show 
much  skill  in  managing  their  affairs.  In  many  cases  they  were  aided  in  purchas- 
ing their  lands  by  their  old  masters,  and  generally  go  to  them  for  advice  as  to 
speculation  and  conduct  in  crop  raising.  The  same  negro  who  will  bitterly 
oppose  his  old  master  politically,  will  implicitly  follow  his  advice  in  matters  of 
labor  and  investment  in  which  he  is  personally  concerned. 

At  every  turn,  and  on  every  available  spot  along  the  shore,  as  one  drifts 
slowly  down  the  lower  Mississippi,  one  is  charmed  to  note  the  picturesque  group- 
ing of  sugar-houses  and  "quarters,"  the  mansions  surrounded  by  splendid  groves, 
and  the  rich  fields  stretching  miles  away  towards  a  dark  belt  of  timber. 

Each  plantation  has  its  group  of  white  buildings,  gleaming  in  the  sun ;  each 
its  long  vistas  of  avenues,  bordered  with  orange-trees ;  for  the  orange  and  the 
sugar-cane  are  friendly  neighbors.  When  the  steamer  swings  around  at  the 
wharf  of  such  a  lordly  plantation  as  that  of  the  "Woodlands"  of  Bradish  John- 
son, or  that  of  Effingham  Lawrence,  the  negroes  come  trooping  out,  men  and 
women  dancing,  somersaulting,  and  shouting;  and,  if  perchance  there  is  music  on 
the  steamer,  no  power  can  restrain  the  merry  antics  of  the  African. 

The  "  Magnolia"  plantation  of  Mr.  Lawrence  is  a  fair  type  of  the  larger  and 
better  class ;  it  lies  low  down  to  the  river's  level,  and  seems  to  court  inundation. 
Stepping  from  the  wharf,  across  a  green  lawn,  the  sugar-house  first  greets 
the  eye,  an  immense  solid  building,  crammed  with  costly  machinery.  Not  far 
from  it  are  the  neat,  white  cottages  occupied  by  the  laborers ;  there  is  the 
kitchen  where  the  field-hands  come  to  their  meals ;  there  are  the  sheds  where  the 
carts  are  boused,  and  the  cane  is  brought  to  be  crushed ;  and,  ranging  in  front  <of 
a  cane-field  containing  many  hundreds  of  acres,  is  a  great  orange  orchard,  the 
branches  of  whose  odorous  trees  bear  literally  golden  fruit;  for,  with  but  little 
care,  they  yield  their  owner  an  annual  income  of  $25,000. 

The  massive  oaks  and  graceful  magnolias  surrounding  the  planter's  mansion 
give  grateful  shade ;  roses  and  all  the  rarer  blossoms  perfume  the  air;  the  river 
current  hums  a  gentle  monotone,  which,  mingled  with  the  music  of  the  myriad 
insect  life,  and  vaguely  heard  on  the  lawn  and  in  the  cool  corridors  of  the  house, 
seems  lamenting  past  grandeur  and  prophesying  of  future  greatness.  For  it  was 
a  grand  and  lordly  life,  that  of  the  owner  of  a  sugar  plantation;  filled  with 
culture,  pleasure,  and  the  refinements  of  living; — but  now! 

Afield,  in  Mr.  Lawrence's  plantation,  and  in  some  others,  one  may  see  the 
steam-plough  at  work,  ripping  up  the  rich  soil.  Great  stationary  engines  pull  it 
rapidly  from  end  to  end  of  the  tracts ;  and  the  darkies,  mounted  on  the  swiftly- 
rolling  machine,  skillfully  guide  its  sharp  blades  and  force  them  into  the  furrows. 
Ere  long,  doubtless,  steam-ploughs  will  be  generally  introduced  on  Louisiana 
sugar  estates.      Four  of   these  stationary  engines,  built  at  Leeds,  England,  and 

6 


82 


A      PROMENADE      IN      A      CANE-FIELD. 


'A  cheery  Chinaman.' 


supplied  with  water  brought  from  the  river  in  mule  carts,  suffice  to  do  the  work 
upon  the  ample  plantation  of  Mr.  Lawrence. 

As  to  the  details  of  plantation  work,  the  negroes,  evidently,  do  not  attend  to 
them  with  quite  the  thoroughness  exacted  under  the  rigid  discipline  of  slavery. 
Evidences  of  neglect,  in  considerable  variety,  offer  them- 
selves to  the  critical  eye.  Entering  the  sugar-house,  the 
amiable  planter  will  present  you  to  a  venerable,  mahog- 
any-looking individual  in  garments  stained  with  saccharine 
juices,  and  with  a  little  tone  of  pride  in  his  voice  will 
tell  you  that  "  this  is  Nelson,  overseer  of  this  place,  who 
has  been  here,  man  and  boy,  forty  years,  and  who 
knows  more  about  the  process  of  sugar- making  than  any 
one  else  on  the  plantation." 

^  Nelson  will,  therefore,  conduct  you  into  the  outer 
shed,  and,  while  showing  you  the  huge  rollers  under 
which  the  canes,  when  carted  in  from  the  fields^  in 
November  or  December,  are  crushed,  will  impress  upon 
you  the  danger  of  early  winter  frosts  which  may  baffle 
every  hope  of  profit,  will  explain  to  you  how  difficult 
and  how  full  of  risks  is  the  culture  of  the  juicy  reed, 
which  must  be  nursed  through  twelve  or  thirteen  weary  months,  and  may  leave 
but  a  meagre  result.  He  will  take  you  across  the  delightfully-shaded  way  into 
one  of  the  fields,  passing  on  the  walk  a  cheery  Chinaman  wearing  a  smile 
which  is  seven  times  childlike  and  bland,  and  point  you  to  the  stalks  of  the 
cane  left  at  the  last  harvest  to  lie  all  winter  in  the  furrows  and  furnish  young 
sprouts  for  the  spring.  These  shapely  and  rich-colored  stalks  have  joints 
every  few  inches  along  their  whole  length,  from  which  spring  out  the  new  buds 
of  promise.  When  the  spring  ploughing  begins,  these  stalks  are  laid  along  the 
beds  of  the  drills,  and  each  shoot,  as  it  makes  its  appearance,  is  carefully 
watched  and  cultured  that  it  may  produce  a  new  cane,  a  great  portion  of  the 
crop  being  thus  reserved,  each  year,  for  seed. 

The  complaisant  overseer  will  give  you  a  profusion  of  details  as  to  how  the 
cane,  if  safe  from  the  accidents  of  the  seasons,  is  cut  down  at  its  perfection  and 
brought  to  the  sugar-house ;  how  all  hands,  black  and  white,  join,  for  many 
days,  in  "hauling"  it  from  the  fields,  and  then  keep  the  mill  going  for  a  week 
night  and  day ;  how  there  is  high  wassail  and  good  cheer  in  the  intervals  of 
the  work,  and  every  nerve  is  strained  to  the  utmost  for  the  completion  of  the 
task.  He  will  show  you  the  great  crushers  which  bring  the  sweetness  out  of 
the  fresh  canes  as  they  are  carried  forward  upon  an  endless  series  of  rollers, 
and  will  then  point  out  the  furnace  into  which  the  refuse  is  thrown  to  be  burned, 
thus  furnishing  the  motive  power  for  crushing  the  stalks  and  for  all  the  minor 
and  subordinate  mechanical  details  in  the  processes  of  the  manufacture.  The 
baggasse,  as  this  refuse  is  called,  usually  furnishes  steam  enough  for  this  purpose, 
and  leaves  nothing  but  a  kind  of  coke  in  the  ash-pit  of  the  furnace ;  no  coal 
being  used  except  in  the  refining  mill's  furnace. 


IN     THE      SUGAR-HOUSE. 


83 


Out  from  the  crushed  arteries  of  the  cane  wells  a  thick,  impure  liquid, 
which  demands  immediate  attention  to  preserve  it  from  spoiling;  and  then  the 
clarifying  process  is  begun  and  continued,  by  the  aid  of  hundreds  of  ingenious 
mechanisms,  whose  names  even  you  will  not  remember  when  Nelson  takes  you 
into  the  refinery. 

You  enter  a  set  of  huge  chambers,  the  floors  of  which  are  sticky  with  sugar, 
and  watch  the  juice  passing  through  various  processes.  There  are  the  great  open 
trays,  traversed  by  copper  and  iron  steam-pipes ;  there  are  the  filter-pans  filled 
with  bone  dust,  from  which  the  liquid  trickles  down.  Now  it  wanders  through 
separators,  and  then  through  bone  dust  again,  onward  toward  granulation  in 
the  vacuum    pans,   and    then    into   coolers,   where   the  sugar    is   kept   in  a   half 


Sugar-cane  Plantation  —  "The  cane  is  cut  down  at  its  perfection  "      [Page  82.] 

liquid  state  by  means  of  revolving  paddles,  until,  finally,  it  comes  to  the  vessels, 
in  which,  by  rapid  whirlings,  all  the  molasses  is  thrown  out;  and  the  molasses, 
leaving  the  dry  sugar  ready  for  commerce,  goes  meandering  among  the  pipes 
under  the  floors,  and  round  and  round  again  through  the  whirling  machines, 
until  there  is  no  suspicion  of  sweetness  in  it,  and  it  is  ignominiously  discharged. 

It  seems  a  pity  that  such  fine  machinery  should  be  in  use  only  during  one- 
sixth  of  the  year,  as  it  would  be  injured  far  less  by  being  kept  constantly  run- 
ning than  by  remaining  idle.  The  new  steam-mills  are,  in  every  point  of  view, 
so  vastly  superior  to  the  old  horse-mills,  that  they  have  been  adopted  on  the 
greater  portion  of  the  sugar  plantations,  and  are  desired  by  every  planter ;  but 


84  THE     RED     RIVER     PARISHES SOUTH-WESTERN     LOUISIANA. 

they  are  so  enormously  expensive,  that  cooperative  or  joint  ownership  is,  in 
many  cases,  essential. 

The  division  of  the  large  plantations  into  small  farms  seems,  sooner  or  later, 
inevitable ;  as  no  one  owner  can,  under  the  new  condition  of  things,  make  the 
necessary  and  continuous  outlay.  In  a  few  years  the  cane  now  crushed  at  one 
of  these  immense  sugar-houses  in  the  winter  months  will  belong,  in  small  lots,  to 
a  hundred  different  men,  instead  of  to  the  one  aristocratic  and  wealthy  planter, 
as  under  the  old  regime. 

There  is  not  a  parish  in  Louisiana  which  does  not  offer  powerful  inducements 
to  immigration ;  not  one  which  will  not  most  bitterly  need  it  if  the  present 
political  condition,  which  is  driving  the  original  inhabitants  from  their  homes,  is 
continued.  Closely  following  upon  the  bloodshed  in  Grant  parish,  came  a  Jiurried, 
voluminous  emigration  of  its  citizens  to  Texas.  They  nocked  to  the  new  Eden 
in  the  greatest  terror,  seeming  eager  to  leave  their  homes  forever  behind  them. 
Still,  these  troubles  must  some  day  have  an  end,  because,  save  in  the  final 
disruption  of  the  world,  there  is  no  end  to  the  fairy  beauty  and  fertility  of 
the  bayou  lands,  or  to  the  luxuriant  vegetation  of  the  vast  plains. 

The  parishes  bordering  on  the  Red  river  are  especially  adapted  to  the 
staples — sugar,  cotton,  wheat,  corn,  rye  and  oats — and  are  always  accessible,  the 
river  in  their  vicinity  remaining  navigable  at  all  seasons  of  the  year.  These 
parishes,  six  in  number,  comprise  more  than  8,500  square  miles  of  rich  alluvial 
land,  and  some  of  the  largest  towns  are  situated  in  them.  Shreveport,  on  the 
west  bank  of  the  river,  is  the  second  city  in  the  State.  It  is  now  the  great  centre 
of  emigration  into  Eastern  and  Northern  Texas,  and  a  line  of  railway  is  projected 
to  it  from  Vicksburg,  which  will  give  it  increased  commercial  importance. 

In  the  parishes  which  comprise  South-western  Louisiana,  there  are  more  than 
3,000,000  acres  of  land  of  almost  inexhaustible  fertility.  The  forests  are  com- 
posed of  oak,  ash,  locust,  pine,  gum,  maple,  cypress,  elm,  willow,  hickory,  pecan, 
persimmon,  dogwood,  mulberry,  and  magnolia  trees.  The  giant  cypresses  along 
the  lakes  and  bayous  are  abundant  enough  to  last  for  a  century.  Employment 
to  hundreds  of  mills  and  thousands  of  workmen  could  readily  be  furnished, 
the  lumber  being  easily  floated  down  the  innumerable  bayous  and  along  the 
lakes  to  market. 

By  the  borders  of  the  great  desolate  sea- marshes  of  St.  Mary  and  Iberia 
runs  a  grand  belt  of  timber  from  one  to  two  miles  wide.  A  western  editor  once 
said  that  if  the  Teche  lands  of  Louisiana  were  in  Illinois,  they  would  bring  from 
$300  to  $500  per  acre.  And  they  could  be  made  worth  that  sum  in  their 
present  situation  in  five  years  from  this  writing  by  the  introduction  of  intelligent 
and  laborious  immigrants,  and  by  the  amplification  of  the  State's  railway  system. 
The  "  Attakapas"  region,  as  the  five  parishes  or  counties  of  St.  Mary,  Iberia, 
Vermilion,  St.  Martin  and  Lafayette  were  originally  called,  from  the  name  of  a 
tribe  of  Indians,  is  certainly  seductive  enough  to  tempt  the  most  fastidious. 

The  cattle- grazing  regions  are  as  extensive  as  remarkable.  There  are  seven 
great  prairies,  respectively  named  Grand  Choiseuil,  Attakapas,  Opelousas,  Grand 
Prairie,  Prairie  Mamon,  Calcasieu,  and  Aubine,  all  covered  with  rich  pasturage. 


CATTLE-RAISING THE     TECHE     COUNTRY.  85 

Thousands  of  cattle  roam  over  these  prairies ;  the  population  is  pastoral  and 
to  a  certain  extent  uncultivated.  There  are  Frenchmen  and  Frenchwomen 
among  them  who  are  as  remote  from  any  active  participation  in  the  politics  of 
the  State  or  the  country  at  large,  as  if  they  lived  in  France.  Cattle  and  horses 
subsist  even  in  the  marshes,  and  graze  the  year  round  upon  a  treacherous 
surface,  in  which  such  animals,  bred  on  solider  ground,  will  instantly  sink  and 
flounder.  I  am  not  willing  to  vouch  for  the  Louisiana  statement  that  these 
marsh-bred  cattle  and  horses  are  web-footed,  though  such  is  the  affirmation. 
One  informant  assured  me  that  a  proper  system  of  transportation  from 
the  marshes  to  New  Orleans  would  develop  this  now  almost  useless  section 
immensely.  Thousands  of  cattle  might  be  turned  in  to  grow  fat  and  bide  the 
time  when  their  owners  should  seek  them  for  the  New  Orleans  market.  They 
would  not  even  need  a  cowherd's  care. 

All  the  prairies  in  Western  Louisiana  are  perennially  green ;  and  upon  them 
were  once  located  the  largest  vacheries  in  the  United  States — vacheries  whose 
owners  sometimes  branded  five  thousand  calves  apiece  yearly.  Sheep  by 
thousands  were  also  raised,  but  both  these  important  industries  seem  to 
have  largely  fallen  off  since  the  war.  The  French  paid  great  attention  to 
the  cattle  and  sheep  husbandry  in  this  section  of  Louisiana  early  in  the  last 
century,  and  it  has  been  estimated  by  a  competent  authority  that,  allowing 
one  animal  to  every  five  acres,  more  than  220,000  cattle  could  be  annually 
reared  and  transported  from  the  single  prairie  of  Opelousas — a  vast  expanse 
of  natural  meadow.  It  was  not  uncommon  for  a  stock  raiser  to  possess  from 
30,000  to  40,000  head  of  cattle,  and  twenty-five  years  before  the  war,  the  stock 
raisers  of  one  parish  in  that  section  owned  100,000  cattle  and  30,000  horses. 

There  is  no  good  reason  why  Louisiana  should  not  be  known  in  future  as 
an  extensive  a  cattle- raising  State  as  her  neighbor,  Texas.  She  has  nothing 
to  fear  from  the  dangers  incurred  by  proximity  to  a  foreign  frontier,  and  there 
are  no  Indians  to  manifest  their  unconquerable  longing  for  "raids." 

But  if  you  wish  once  again  to  find  the  lost  gate  of  Eden,  if  you  wish 
to  gain  the  promised  land,  if  you  wish  to  see  in  this  rude,  practical  America 
of  ours  an  "earthly  paradise,"  where  life  is  good,  because  Nature  has  invested 
it  with  everything  that  is  delicious  and  fairest;  if  you  wish  to  see  plantations 
at  the  height  of  culture — lawns  as  fragrant,  as  clean-shaven,  as  nobly  shaded 
by  graceful  trees  as  any  sovereign's — seek  the  Teche  country.  It  is  the  pearl  of 
Louisiana ;  it  is  the  gem  of  the  South.  Thither,  more  than  a  century  ago,  when 
the  cruel  order  of  the  English  dispersed  them  from  their  homes,  Andry  and  the 
exiled  Acadians  took  their  mournful  way.  Thither  they  went,  threading  the 
swamps  and  wandering  up  the  beautiful  Atchafalaya,  and  her  lakes,  where 

"Water   lilies   in   myriads   rocked    on   the   slight   undulations 
Made   by   the   passing  oars,    and,    resplendent   in  beauty   the   lotus 
Lifted  her   golden   crown   above   the  heads   of  the   boatmen. 
Faint   was   the   air  with   the   odorous  breath   of  magnolia  blossoms, 
And  with   the   heat   of  noon ;    and   numberless   sylvan    islands, 
Fragrant   and   thickly   embowered   with   blossoming  hedges   of  roses, 
Near  to  whose   shores   they   glided   along,    invited  to   slumber." 


86  NEW      IBERIA GRAND      COTE      ISLAND. 

Now,  as  then,  the  traveler,  pushing  his  way  in  a  tiny  steamer,  or  in  a  shallop 
or  pirogue,  can  hear — 

"Far   off,    indistinct,    as    of  wave    or   wind   in    the    forest, 
Mixed    with   the   whoop   of  the   crane,    and   the   roar   of  the    grim    alligator," 

strange  sounds  from  the  dark  forests  and  the  lonely  lands. 

From  Berwick's  Bay,  where  the  rich  fields  lie  trustingly  upon  the  water, 
and  strange  vines  and  creepers  seem  to  caress  the  waves,  and  bid  them  be 
tranquil,  ascend  the  Teche  bayou,  and  lose  yourself  in  the  tangled  network  of 
lake  and  lakelet,  plain  and  forest,  plantation  and  swamp.  By  day  you  shall  have 
the  exquisite  glory  of  the  sun,  which,  gleaming  on  the  seigniorial  residences,  on 
the  great  white  sugar- houses  with  their  tall  chimneys,  on  the  long  rows  of 
cabins  for  the  laborers,  on  the  villas  peering  from  orange  groves  and  bosquets  of 
the  mespilus,  makes  all  doubly  bright  and  beautiful ;  and  at  evening  the  moon 
will  lend  her  witchery  to  swell  your  surprise  and  admiration. 

You  will  drift  on  by  superb  knots  of  shrubbery,  from  which  sprightly  birds 
are  singing  madrigals ;  past  floating  bridges  and  garden  bowers ;  past  ruined 
plantations,  the  wrecks  of  the  war ;  past  dense  cypress  swamps,  bordered  by 
picturesque  groupings  of  oaks  and  ash  and  gum-trees ;  through  that  fine  region 
stretching  from  the  entrance  of  the  bayou  into  the  parish  of  Iberia  and  the  town 
of  New  Iberia,  where  the  beautiful  water  willows  and  forest  trees  lean  forward 
from  the  banks  as  if  to  see  themselves  reflected  in  the  stream ;  where  the  wheels 
of  passing  steamers  rudely  brush  the  arching  foliage ;  where  the  live  oak  spreads 
its  ample  spray  over  some  cool  dell  upon  whose  grassy  carpet  grow  strange 
bright-hued  flowers  ;  and  where  vistas  of  forest  glade — happy  sylvan  retreats — 
open  as  by  enchantment,  and  moonlight  makes  delicious  checkerwork  of  gleam 
and  shadow. 

Below  New  Iberia,  on  Petit  Anse  Island,  there  is  a  salt  mine  sixty  feet 
beneath  the  level  of  the  Gulf  of  Mexico,  and  you  may  go  down  through  fifty- 
eight  feet  of  solid  rock-salt,  to  watch  the  miners  pick  out  the  crystal  freight 
which  has  proved  superior  to  any  other  salt  found  in  the  Southern  market.  Or 
you  may  penetrate  the  romantic  country  near  Lake  Peigneur,  and  even  hunt 
the  genial  comedian — the  noble  artist  who  created  the  role  of  "  Rip  Van 
Winkle," — in  his  "Orange  Island"  retreat. 

The  richness  of  Louisiana  may  perhaps  be  best  illustrated  by  this  same  island. 
It  is  one  of  many  in  the  lake,  rising  high  above  it  and  the  surrounding 
prairie.  It  possesses  delicious  lawns  miles  in  length,  sloping  gently  southward ; 
orange  groves,  which  in  1868,  after  a  neglect  of  ten  years,  produced  half  a  mil- 
lion oranges ;  bold  banks  and  knolls  with  northward  outlook ;  and  delightful  sea 
breezes  constantly  blowing  over  the  whole  length  and  breadth  of  its  lovely 
lands.  On  Grand  Cote  Island  you  may  wander  among  wide  fields  of  cotton  and 
of  corn,  or  you  may  climb  steep  hill-sides  to  find  a  lake  of  purest  water  high  up 
among  them,  its  surface  covered  with  water  lilies ;  or  you  may  sit  in  garden 
bowers  over  which  the  Scuppernong  grape-vines  run  riot,  and  gaze  out  upon  the 
towering  magnolia,  the  blooming  cotton  and  the  waving  cane. 


FORESTS FINE      ESTATES HEALTH. 


87 


The  forests  in  the  parish  of  St.  Martin,  in  the  Techc  valley,  contain  millions 
of  tall,  straight  cypress-trees  ;  and  beyond  are  stretches  of  ash,  gum,  hickory, 
black  walnut,  magnolia,  live,  white  and  red  oaks,  linn,  pecan,  sycamore,  and 
other  trees.  There  are  also  here  some  grand  estates,  notably  those  of  General 
Declouet,  Mr.  Lestrapes,  and  Dr.  Wilkins.  General  Declouet's  mansion  is  a  fine 
type  of  the  old  Creole  house,  with  spacious  halls  and  corridors,  baronial  dining- 
room,  and  portrait  galleries  from  which  look  down  the  faces  of  a  hundred  ances- 
tors. Avenues,  bordered  with  China-trees  or  with  pines,  lead  up  to  it;  while 
magnolias,  fig-trees,  and  live  oaks  are  scattered  throughout  the  grounds. 

One  finds  superb  forests  everywhere  in  Louisiana.  They  are  among  the 
chief  glories  of  the  State.  One  may  purchase,  for  an  insignificant  sum,  a  lovely 
natural  park,  with  trees  in  it  Avhich  an  English  duke  might  covet  for  his  estate. 


"The  beautiful 

The  oaks  which  stud  the  beautiful  "  City  Park,"  and  the  "race-course  "  grounds, 
in  New  Orleans,  are  exceedingly  fine.  City  and  country  alike  abound  in  the 
most  delicious  foliage. 

St.  Mary's  parish  formerly  contained  170  sugar  plantations,  scattered  along 
the  banks  of  the  Teche,  the  Atchafalaya,  and  the  various  bayous  and  water- 
ways in  that  section.  In  the  same  parish,  13,000  slaves  were  owned  before 
the  war,  and  more  than  100  vessels  plied  between  Franklin  (a  pretty, 
cultured  town,  twenty  miles  from  Brashear)  and  various  Northern  and  Southern 
ports.      The  fertile  lands  readily  yield  a  hogshead   of  sugar  to    the    acre,  and 


MAP    SHOWING    THE    DISTRIBUTION    OF    THE    COLORED    POPULATION    OF    THE    UNITED    STATES. 


88  THE      SALT      REGION. 

the  manufacture  may  begin  early  in  November.  Flooded  rice-lands  produce 
ten  barrels  to  the  acre ;  unflooded,  six.  There  are  orange  orchards  in  this 
parish  producing  3,000,000  of  oranges  annually.     Such  facts  are  eloquent. 

Lands  in  certain  of  the  parishes,  not  very  far  from  towns  and  trade  centres, 
can  be  generally  purchased  at  from  $3  to  $15  per  acre  ;  those  more  remote  are 
only  worth  $1  or  $1.50  per  acre.  The  general  health  of  South-western  Loui- 
siana is  good ;  there  is  no  greater  error  than  the  common  supposition  in  the 
North  that  the  lowland  climate  is  fatal  to  health.  There  is  not  a  heartier  or 
healthier  population  in  the  Union  than  that  of  South-western  Louisiana ;  none 
more  frank,  unsuspicious  and  generous.  Of  course  hostility  and  even  ostracism, 
at  the  present  time,  are  the  lot  of  such  as  take  sides  for  the  Kellogg  Government ; 
but  for  him  who  does  not  take  active  part,  no  matter  what  his  opinions  may  be, 
there  is  never  even  a  harsh  word.  The  recent  operations  of  the  "White 
League "  in  Northern  Louisiana  have  been  prompted  by  the  extremists  of 
the  Democratic  party,  in  the  vain  hope  of  intimidating  negro  voters,  and 
driving  out  "Yankees"  who  are  settled  in  some  of  the  parishes,  and  who  vote 
the  Republican  ticket.  The  assassinations  of  which  this  League  has  been 
guilty,  and  the  proscriptive  measures  which  it  has  adopted,  are  condemned  in 
the  strongest  terms  by  large  numbers  of  native  Conservatives  in  other  sections 
of  the  State,  who  realize  that  no  reform  is  possible  on  the  basis  of  an  exclusive 
white  man's  government,  and  who  appreciate  the  immense  harm  done  the 
material  interests  of  the  commonwealth  by  a  revival  of  the  old  Ku-Klux  tactics 
which  once  disgraced  the  State. 

Louisiana  has  some  few  valuable  minerals,  and  the  discovery  of  rock-salt  in 
Vermilion  parish,  and  of  crystalline  sulphur  on  the  Calcasieu  river,  has  encour- 
aged a  search  for  others.  Iron  is  scattered  at  various  depths  below  the  surface 
of  the  State  south  of  Red  river,  and  in  some  of  the  parishes  it  is  so  abundant  as 
to  obstruct  the  ploughs  or  the  hoes  of  the  farmers.  Valuable  deposits  of  organ- 
ized peat  are  found  in  many  places  near  the  coast,  and  the  investment  of  a  little 
capital  might  soon  develop  a  great  industry  in  the  preparation  of  this  important 
fuel.  Coal  abounds  in  certain  regions  through  which  railway  lines  are  already 
projected,  and  the  petroleum  wells  in  Bossier,  Bienville,  and  Natcnitoches 
parishes,  as  well  as  in  a  broad  belt  extending  nearly  to  the  Gulf  in  Calcasieu 
parish,  promise  a  remarkable  development.  The  salt  region  runs  through  five 
islands,  ranged  along  the  coast  for  about  twenty  miles  west  of  the  mouth  of 
the  Atchafalaya.     One  of  these  islands  is   140  feet  above  the  sea-level. 


VIII. 

THE     POLITICAL     SITUATION     IN     LOUISIANA. 

THE  testimony  of  most  of  the  planters  in  Louisiana,  as  elsewhere  throughout 
the  South,  is  that  the  free  negro  works  well,  and  earns  his  wages,  save 
when  he  is  distracted  by  politics.  Indeed,  there  are  none  who  are  willing  to 
assert  that  free  labor  has  not  been  a  success ;  and  the  majority  would  prefer  it 
to  the  most  arbitrary  days  of  ownership,  if  the  State  were  otherwise  in  a  settled 
condition. 

It  is,  nevertheless,  evident  that  political  excitements,  gotten  up  by  adven- 
turers with  the  hope  of  obtaining  power,  take  the  negro's  attention  altogether 
too  much  from  his  work,  and  constitute  a  species  of  mild  intellectual  dissipation, 
which  he  thinks  it  vastly  fine  to  indulge  in,  but  which  only  unfits  him  for  serious 
efforts  at  progress,  and  factitiously  elevates  him  to  a  position  directly  opposed  to 
the  interests  of  his  fellow- citizens. 

Judging  from  conversations  with  great  numbers  of  persons,  there  is  not 
much  hope  that  the  equality  of  races  will  be  at  present  recognized  by  the 
white  man  in  Louisiana.  He  will  not  admit  that  the  negro  is  at  all  competent  to 
legislate  for  him,  or  to  vote  with  him  on  matters  of  common  importance  to 
white  and  black. 

While  he  has  no  desire  to  see  any  of  the  conditions  of  that  kind  of  society 
which  prevailed  before  the  war  re-established,  he  refuses  to  recognize  or  acqui- 
esce in  the  actual  condition.  Having  been,  as  he  considers,  doomed  by  the 
revolution,  he  sits  haughtily  tranquil,  wrapped  in  reserve,  save  when  he  ventures 
to  predict  the  downfall  of  the  Republic,  and  to  lament  the  despotism  under 
which  he  asserts  that  he  is  kept.  He  is  fond  of  gloomy  horoscopes,  and  delights 
in  announcing  to  the  world  that  the  precedent  established  in  Louisiana  by  the 
Lynch  returning-board  and  the  Durell  decision  will  yet  be  disastrous  to  New 
York  and  Massachusetts. 

He  is  not  more  glad  to  be  rid  of  slavery  than  he  would  be  to  see  the  last 
negro  vanish  from  the  soil.  He  is  weary  of  the  whole  subject  of  politics; 
anxious  for  immigration,  yet  doubtful  of  its  practical  results;  willing  to  guarantee, 
to  the  extent  allowed  by  his  impaired  fortunes,  any  reasonable  enterprise  tending 
toward  the  commercial  development  of  the  State,  but  discouraged,  and  often- 
times distracted. 

Impulsive,  intensely  individual,  and  extremely  sensitive,  he  fancies  that  he  sees 
fresh  humiliations  in  the  thousand  changes  which  are  but  the  inevitable  attendants 
of  the  revolution.  In  the  parishes,  the  tyranny  of  those  who  use  the  new  political 
element  for  base  purposes  is  constantly  increasing  in  boldness  and  violence — now 


90  POLITICAL     TROUBLES  —  RECONSTRUCTION     MEASURES. 

"showing  itself  in  an  appetite  for  public  plunder,  and  now  in  shielding  from  richly 
merited  punishment  some  infamous  scoundrel. 

Sometimes  the  negro,  annoyed  and  perplexed,  takes  the  reins  into  his  own 
hands,  and  then  follow  scenes  of  bloodshed  and  violence ;  then  comes  to  the 
front  the  question  of  black  versus  white,  and  the  commonwealth  is,  as  nearly 
always  when  the  Legislature  is  in  session,  convulsed  to  its  centre.  Meantime 
professional  politicians  and  lobbyists  constantly  arrange  new  plans  for  the  pacifi- 
cation of  parties,  for  compromises  never  to  be  effected,  and  victories  never  to 
be  won. 

The  citizens  are  willing  and  anxious  to  work,  but  all  their  energy,  all  the 
intense  commercial  ambition  of  New  Orleans  is  neutralized  by  the  incubus  of  a 
legislature  which  in  no  wise  properly  represents  the  people.  The  negro  afield, 
with  his  sturdy  family  around  him,  cultivating  the  little  plot  which  has  at  last 
become  his,  and  the  white  man,  with  his  own  hand  to  the  plough,  showing  that 
he  no  longer  thinks  labor  degrading,  are,  to  be  sure,  gratifying  sights,  which 
present  themselves  from  time  to  time ;  but  they  are  by  no  means  so  common 
as  they  would  be  if  the  State  were  not  constantly  anguish- stricken,  overwhelmed 
with  taxation  and  myriad  debts,  and  hindered  from  making  the  improvements 
necessary  to  the  securing  of  new  trade  and  consequent  prosperity. 

There  are  in  Louisiana  men  of  brilliant  and  imposing  eloquence ;  men  of 
entrain  and  magnetism,  who  seem  fashioned  for  leadership ;  and  yet,  strange  as 
it  may  appear,  who  take  but  little  interest  in  the  affairs  of  their  own  State ;  who 
either  content  themselves  with  deriding  their  inferiors,  or  with  watching  chances 
for  personal  elevation  by  taking  advantage  of  the  weakness  or  insincerity  of 
those  in  power.  They  laugh  at  the  discomfiture  of  their  fellows,  while  the  house 
is  being  pulled  down  over  their  own  heads.  With  anarchy  at  their  doors,  they 
refuse  to  take  the  first  step  toward  reconciliation,  or  a  proper  understanding 
between  the  races  now  so  equally  divided  as  to  numbers  within  the  State 
limits. 

In  1864  Michael  Hahn  was  chosen  first  free  State  Governor  of  Louisiana. 
On  the  occasion  of  his  inauguration,  the  celebrated  Gilmore,  then  a  band  director 
in  the  Federal  army,  gave  his  first  mammoth  jubilee.  Cannon  roared,  drums 
rolled,  the  earth  shook.  A  constitutional  convention  was  next  held,  and  a 
constitution  prohibiting  slavery  was  a  few  months  later  adopted  by  the  Recon- 
struction party.  In  1865  Henry  C.  Warmoth  was  elected  a  delegate  from  the 
■'  territory  "  of  Louisiana  to  the  National  Congress.  The  negroes  placed  him  in 
office,  and  supplied  him  with  funds.  Under  Banks,  he  had  been  provost  judge 
of  the  parish  of  Orleans,  and  there  had  acquired  influence  over,  and  the  confi- 
dence of,  the  colored  voters. 

In  the  fall  of  1865  the  first  general  election  under  the  new  State  constitution 
was  held,  and  the  Democrats  were  overwhelmingly  successful  in  all  sections. 
They  elected  J.  Madison  Wells  Governor,  and  at  the  first  session  of  their  Legis- 
lature passed  several  bills  which  placed  them  in  direct  antagonism  with  the 
colored  people.  Among  the  measures  instrumental  in  bringing  on  a  conflict  of 
races  was  a  bill  for  the  regulation  of  labor,  which  the  negroes  bitterly  opposed. 


NEGRO   LEGISLATION THE  KELLOGG  PARTY.  91 

In  1866  a  new  constitutional  convention  was  held,  the  members  of  the  Radical 
party  desiring  to  check  the  Democratic  successes  by  remodeling  the  constitution. 
Riots  occurred,  in  which  white  and  black  men  lost  their  lives.  This  led  to  the 
appointment  of  a  special  committee  of  investigation  by  Congress,  and  to  the 
inauguration  of  the  policy  of  reconstruction. 

In  the  fall  of  1867  another  convention  met,  which  had  been  provided  for  by 
the  Reconstruction  Act,  and  in  May  of  1868  a  thoroughly  radical  constitution 
was  adopted,  Henry  C.  Warmoth  being  elected  Governor,  and  a  Republican 
Legislature,  of  course  largely  composed  of  ignorant  negroes,  coming  into  power. 
This  legislative  session  was  occupied  by  petty  squabbles,  and  by  the  passage  of 
many  bills  in  the  interest  of  corrupt  jobs.  The  Conservatives  did  not,  how- 
ever, yield  their  power  without  some  show  of  resistance,  and  the  Presidential 
campaign  of  1868  was  the  occasion  of  much  severe  fighting  in  the  State.  The 
negroes  were  very  shamefully  intimidated,  and  but  few  of  them  succeeded  in 
casting  their  votes  for  President. 

However,  the  new  party,  composed  of  ignorant  and  immoral  negroes,  led  on 
by  reckless  and  greedy  white  adventurers,  held  Louisiana  completely  in  its 
power,  and  gross  frauds  were  perpetrated.  Ignorance,  captivated  by  the  glitter 
of  money,  and  misled  by  wily  sharpers,  thrust  ruin  in  a  hundred  ways  upon  the 
unfortunate  State.  For  two  or  three  years  the  most  scandalous  plundering  was 
indulged  in.  The  Governor  was  himself  disgusted  with  such  manceuvres,  and 
gradually  showed  a  leaning  toward  the  respectable  Conservatives,  who  now  and 
then  gathered  around  him.  But  the  Conservatives  had  waited  too  long  before 
attempting  a  policy  of  conciliation.  The  negroes  were  thoroughly  estranged, 
and  could  not  be  persuaded  to  listen  to  anything  which  they  might  say.  A 
division  took  place  in  the  Republican  party ;  the  Legislature  became  hostile  to 
Governor  Warmoth,  and  in  the  summer  of  187 1  a  new  convention  was  held  in 
New  Orleans.  Both  wings  of  the  now  divided  Republican  party  attempted  to 
obtain  control  of  this  convention,  which  was  held  in  the  Custom- House.  The 
Federal  appointees  in  New  Orleans — Mr.  Casey,  the  collector  of  the  port,  Mr. 
Packard,  the  United  States  Marshal,  and  others — refused  the  opposite  faction 
admission  to  the  convention,  the  services  of  a  company  of  United  States  infantry 
being  secured  to  prevent  Warmoth's  entrance. 

Upon  this,  Warmoth  and  his  party  declared  war  against  the  Federal 
appointees,  held  an  opposition  convention,  and  even  sent  a  committee  to  Presi- 
dent Grant  asking  for  the  removal  of  Packard  and  Casey.  The  President 
disregarded  this  request,  and  Warmoth  and  his  friends  therefore  opposed  his 
re-election,  Warmoth  even  braving  the  anger  of  the  Administration  by  partici- 
pating in  the  Cincinnati  "  Liberal  "  convention  of  1872. 

The  division  in  the  Republican  ranks  grew  daily  more  pronounced,  and  when 
the  time  came  to  choose  a  new  governor  candidates  were  abundant.  The  Con- 
servatives finally  united  upon  John  McEnery ;  Warmoth  ran  on  an  independent 
ticket,  and  the  Federal,  or  "Custom- House  "  party,  brought  forward  William  Pitt 
Kellogg,  the  then  United  States  Senator  from  the  State.  Mr.  Kellogg  had  been 
collector  of  the  port  of  New  Orleans  under  President  Johnson,  and  had  acquired 


92 


THE      FEDERAL      INTERVENTION      IN      LOUISIANA. 


some  little  knowledge  of  Louisiana  politics.  He  was,  without  doubt,  beaten  in 
the  election  for  governor,  McEnery  being  unquestionably  elected,  although  it  is 
conceded  on  all  hands  that  frauds  were  liberally  practiced  by  both  parties. 

The  Conservatives,  who  had  doubtless  learned  wisdom  from  their  political 
experiences  since  the  close  of  the  war,  were  about  to  resume  power,  not  a  little 
glad  to  be  freed  from  the  contest  of  factions  which  had  so  long  paralyzed  the 
State,  when  their  hopes  were  dashed  by  sudden  Federal  intervention. 

The  history  of  the  infamy  which,  in  the  name  of  law,  was  perpetrated  in  New 
Orleans,  in  December  of  1872,  is  well  known  to  all  who  have  taken  any  interest 
in  general  politics.  The  non- elected  Legislature  was  placed  in  power  by  Federal 
bayonets,  called  into  requisition  by  an  order  issued  by  a  Federal  judge  named 
Durell.  A  returning-board  which  had  not,  and  did  not  pretend  to  have  the  elec- 
tion returns  before  it,  yet  which  was  the  only  one  recognized  by  Judge  Durell, 
who  was  firm  in  his  policy  of  usurpation,  seated  the  Kellogg  government,  and 

struck  a  direct  blow  at  the  will  of 
the  majority.  It  pushed  Louisiana  to 
the  very  verge  of  ruin. 

In  his  speech  on  the  Louisiana 
bill,  made  before  the  United  States 
Senate  early  in  1873,  Carl  Schurz 
has  briefly  summed  up  the  whole 
matter  in  the  following  words. 
Speaking  of  the  Legislature  mentioned 
above,  he  says : 

"There  was,  I  believe,  not  a  single 
one  of  them  who  was  returned  by  a 
board  that  had  the  official  returns  of 
the  election  in  its  hands  or  had  ever 
seen  them.  By  virtue  of  what,  then, 
were  those  men  put  in  the  Legislature  ? 
Not  by  virtue  of  votes,  not  by  virtue 
of  returns,  but  upon  the  ground  of  newspaper  reports,  of  wild  guesses,  of  forged 
affidavits,  of  the  usurpation  of  a  Federal  judge,  and  of  Federal  bayonets. 
That  was  their  whole  title  to  the  legislative  capacity  which  they  assumed. 

"  What  was  their  first  act  ?  They  impeached  the  Governor.  Throwing  aside 
all  the  forms  of  impeachment  prescribed  by  law,  they  impeached  and  suspended 
the  Governor,  if  a  summary  decree  can  be  called  impeachment  and  suspension. 
They  who  had  not  a  shadow  of  right  based  upon  law,  upon  votes,  upon  an  elec- 
tion, upon  legal  returns,  proceeded  to  undo  one  governor  and  to  make  another. 
That  second  governor  was  Pinchback.  The  National  Government  recognized 
him  as  the  Governor  of  Louisiana. 

"  Then  they  proceeded  to  what  they  called  the  canvass  of  the  votes  in  the 
Legislature,  not  canvassing  legal  returns  of  voters  in  any  legal  form,  but  a  can- 
vass on  the  ground  of  newspaper  reports,  wild  guesses,  and  forged  affidavits. 
What  I   say  here  is  by  no  means  an   exaggerated  assertion,  for  it  is  distinctly 


The  Supreme  Court  —  New  Orleans. 


THE   USURPATION ITS   EFFECTS. 


93 


proven  by  the  testimony,  and  I  think  it  is  denied  by  no  one.  Then  they 
declared  the  men  of  their  choice :  Kellogg,  Governor ;  Antoine,  Lieutenant- 
Governor,  and  so  on  all  the  State  officers  of  Louisiana. 

"Thus  the  usurpation  is  consummated — a  usurpation  without  the  shadow  of 
a  law  as  an  excuse;  with  nothing  but  fraud  and  force  to  stand  upon;  a  usurpa- 
tion palpable,  gross,  shameless,  and  utterly  subversive  of  all  principles  of  republi- 
can government ;  a  usurpation  such  as  this  country  has  never  seen,  and  probably 
no  citizen  of  the  United  States  has  ever  dreamed  of.  The  offspring  of  this  Legis- 
lature is  the  Kellogg  government." 

What  has  been  the  result  of  this  usurpation  ?  The  State  has  been  broken 
down  by  taxation  and  debt ;  the  negro  has  been  demoralized ;  the  principal  cities 
and  towns  are  impoverished. 

Had. the  usurpation  been  confined  within  bounds,  the  people  of  Louisiana 
would  doubtless  have  borne  it  in  silence ;  but  the  usurping  government  was  not 
content  with  ordinary  measures.  Possessed  of  arbitrary  power,  it  proceeded  to 
exercise  it  in  the  most  odious  fashion.  Scarcely  ninety  days  after  the  Durell 
decision,  the  judges  whom,  by  large  majorities,  the  people  of  the  parish  of 
Orleans  had  elected  to  preside  over  certain  district  courts,  and  who  had  been 
commissioned  by  Warmoth  and  sworn  in,  were  unseated  by  force,  and  the  can- 
didates who  had  been  defeated  were  put  in  their  places. 

This  was  the  signal  for  an  uprising.  The  incipient  riot,  however,  was 
speedily  quelled,  and  the  natives  of  the  State  who  did  not  propose  to  compro- 
mise their  loyalty  by  a  collision  with  the  United  States  troops,  stationed  in  New 
Orleans,  were  remanded  to  their  condition  of  a  subjugated  class. 

Resistance  to  taxation,  which  began  in  1873,  was  pretty  effectually  checked 
by  the  proclamation  of  the  President,  which  made  such  resistance  dangerous. 
People  who  wish  to  keep  in  their  hands  what  little  property  now  remains  to 
them  are  compelled  in  one  manner  or  another  to  pay  up. 

New  Orleans  has  suffered  peculiarly,  its  taxable  property  being  cumbered 
with  two  huge  debts,  that  of  the  city  itself,  now  estimated  at  about  $22,500,000, 
and    over    three-fifths    of   the    State's 


various  liabilities.  While  the  city 
groans  under  such  enormous  taxation, 
it  has  been  loaded  down  with  grievous 
licenses  on  all  trades,  professions,  and 
occupations,  amounting  to  nearly 
$1,000,000  annually. 

Under  these  burdens  it  is  not  as- 
tonishing that  real  estate  in  the  city 
has  declined  from  thirty  to  more  than 
fifty  per  cent.  The  double  public  debt 
of  the  city  is  already  more  than  one- 
fourth  of  its  property  assessment,  and 
many  times  more  than  the  value  of  all 
the  available  property  now  owned  by 


The  United  States  Barracks  —  New  Orleans. 


94  MUNICIPAL      AFFAIRS      IN      NEW      ORLEANS. 

the  corporation.  The  annual  expenditures  of  the  city  were  increased  from 
$3,767,000  in  1862,  to  $6,961,381  in  1872;  and  still  mount  upward.  Mean- 
time the  streets  remain  uncared  for,  and  the  treasury  is  empty.  Where  has 
the  money  gone  ? 

The  city  certificates  are  sold  on  the  street  at  enormous  discounts ;  the  Legis- 
lature's sessions  cost  the  people  half  a  million  dollars  yearly,  instead  of  $100,000 
as  in  i860,  and  this  also  the  city  is  compelled  mainly  to  pay;  whoever,  therefore, 
buys  property  in  the  city  of  New  Orleans  buys  with  it  a  share  of  a  great  and 
discouraging  public  debt. 

There  is  some  hope,  -however,  at  present,  for  the  administration  of  the 
metropolis.  The  economy  inaugurated  in  1873  will  be  but  of  small  avail  for 
a  year  or  two,  for  the  sums  expended  around  the  City  Hall  in  New  Orleans 
were  so  enormous  that  gradual  reduction  will  not  relieve  the  people  much. 
The  budget  of  1872  provided  for  the  payment  of  the  sum  of  $229,000  to  the 
various  employes  about  the  City  Hall,  or  more  than  is  annually  paid  to  the 
President,  Vice-President,  judges  of  the  Supreme  Court,  and  cabinet  officers  of 
the  United  States,  and  the  State  officers  of  Louisiana.  There  was  a  veritable 
army  of  office-holders. and  dependents  about  the  municipal  head-quarters. 

The  government  of  the  city  is  now  entirely  vested  in  a  mayor,  and  seven 
"  administrators,"  respectively  charged  with  the  administration  of  finance,  com- 
merce, improvements,  assessments,  police,  public  accounts,  and  water  works  and 
public  buildings.  These  eight  gentlemen  constitute  what  is  known  as  the  City 
Council,  and  are  elected  biennially  at  the  time  of  the  election  for  members  of  the 
General  Assembly. 

The  famous  Board  of  Metropolitan  Police,  created  by  Warmoth,  is  in  no  man- 
ner under  the  direction  of  the  City  Council,  the  administrator  of  the  police 
department  being  merely  an  ex-ofhcio  member  of  that  board.  The  Metropolitan 
Police  constitute  a  body  directed  by  a  board  controlled  by  the  State  Executive, 
and  which  is  paid  by  taxes  levied  upon  the  city.  It  is  in  reality  an  armed  mili- 
tary force  which  the  central  State  Government  maintains  in  the  capital  for  the 
enforcement  of  its  measures  and  the  prevention  of  riots.  Since  Warmoth  created 
it,  its  cost  has  been  enormous,  amounting  to  hundreds  of  thousands  of  dollars 
yearly.  The  police  expenses  for  the  year  ending  October  1st,  1869,  were 
$930,809.09;  for  1870'  $725,357.73;  and  for  1871,  about  $800,000.  The 
municipality  constantly  threatens  rebellion  against  the  control  of  its  action  by 
State  interference,  but,  meantime,  that  control  increases  in  strength  and 
extent. 

The  speculation  in  warrants,  the  creation  of  certain  courts  out  of  elements 
diametrically  opposed  to  the  real  interests  of  the  people  of  the  State,  are  evils 
which  are  even  worse  than  they  have  been  represented  by  the  injured,  and  for 
which  there  is  no  excuse.  The  Federal  Government  may  and  should  protect  the 
freedman  in  the  rights  given  him  by  the  revolution  consequent  on  the  war;  but  it 
should  not  permit  the  use  of  ignorant  masses  of  negroes  as  stepping-stones  to 
tyrannical,  centralized  power ;  it  should  not  allow  interlopers  to  array  the  black 
freedman  against  the  white  freeman,  under  any  pretense  whatsoever. 


THE    STATE      FINANCES THE      NEGRO      LEGISLATURE. 


95 


To  give  an  account  of  the  condition  of  the  State  finances  is  somewhat  difficult. 
It  was  stated,  in  1872,  that  the  amount  of  the  actual  funded  and  unfunded  debt 
was  between  $24,000,000  and  $25,000,000;  that  the  contingent  liabilities 
amounted  to  $5,483,602  ;  and  that  the  amount  of  bonds  "  authorized  "  by  the 
Legislature,  but  not  yet  issued,  was  $10,770,000,  making  a  total  of  actual,  contin- 
gent, and  prospective  liability  which  is  far  from  cheering,  especially  as  from 
i860  to  1 87 1  the  valuation  of  property  in  the  State  decreased  from  $435,000,000 
to  $250,000,000. 

With  the  possibility  of  a  war  of  races  constantly  thrusting  forward  its  ugly 
head,  it  is  easy  to  perceive  how  industrial  development  is  hindered  and  capital 
frightened  away ;  it  is  easy  to  see  how  passions  which  should  long  since  have 
become  extinct  still  smoulder,  and  are  ready  at  a  moment's  warning  to  burst 
forth  into  anarchy  and  chaos. 

It  is  now  and  then  asserted  that  corruption,  consequent  upon  despair  and  dis- 
gust, has  affected  the  ranks  of  the  native  born  citizens ;  and  that  there  have  been 
cases  where  even  they  have  crowded  the  lobbies  of  the  hybrid  legislature 
in  the  interests  of  corporations.  This  seems  hardly  credible,  when  it  is 
remembered  that  the  masses  of  the  conservative  citizens  vehemently  assert  that 
the  returning-board  which  established  that  legislature  in  power  had  no  official 
statements  in  its  possession  on  which  to  base  its  conclusion,  and  since  they  are 
supported  in  their  assertion  by  the  declaration  of  a  Committee  of  the  United 
States  Senate  that  the  Lynch  returning-board's  canvass  "  had  no  semblance  of 
integrity." 

A  visit  to  Mechanics'  Institute,  the  seat  of  the  Kellogg  Legislature,  during 
the  session,  is  a  curious  experience.  At  the  doors  stand  negro  policemen,  armed 
with    clubs    and    revolvers;    and   crowds   of  blacks    obstruct    the  passage-ways. 

Mounting  a    staircase    covered    with  _ : 

old,  tobacco  stained  matting,  one 
finds  himself  in  the  House  of  Repre- 
sentatives, where  sit  the  law- makers 
with  their  feet  upon  their  desks. 
Nearly  all  the  honorable  members 
are  black ;  some  of  them  are  so 
completely  ignorant  that  they  cannot 
follow  the  course  of  debate.  But  all 
are  so  drilled  by  the  adventurers 
who  control  them  that  their  oppo- 
sition to  anything  likely  to  better 
the  present  horrible  political  condi- 
tion is  firm  and  determined.  There 
are  also  many  blacks  in  the  Senate. 
When  a  colored  man  is  in  the  chair, 
he  is  always  falling  into  profound 
errors  with  regard  to  his  rulings  and 

decisions.  He     finds      it     difficult     tO  Mechanics'  Institute  — New  Orleans. 


g6  THE      DECLINE     OF      REAL      ESTATE. 

follow  the  course  of  any  bill  the  moment  half-a-dozen  members  are  speaking  of 
it,  and  constantly  submits  to  corrections  and  suggestions  from  some  lean  white 
man,  dressed  in  new  clothes,  who  smiles  contemptuously,  as,  from  a  carpet-bag 
point  of  view,  he  superintends  this  legislative  farce.  And  this  scene  has  been 
enacted  for  six  weary  years — the  State  meantime  sinking  deeper  and  deeper  into 
the  abyss  of  crushing  taxation.  It  is  not  wonderful  that  "White  Leagues,"  in 
opposition  to  negro  government,  are  springing  up  throughout  Louisiana. 

Here  are  some  instances  which  will  show  how  greatly  property  has  decreased 
in  value  under  the  present  crushing  taxation  and  wholesale  plundering. 

A  gentleman  in  New  Orleans  was,  some  time  since,  offered  a  loan  of  $6,000 
on  the  security  of  certain  real  estate  owned  by  him.  He  did  not  then  need  the 
money ;  but  recently  went  to  the  capitalist  and  said,  "  I  will  now  accept  your 
kind  offer."  Said  the  capitalist,  "  I  would  not  now  lend  you  $600  on  the 
property.  It  is  worth  nothing  as  security.  No  property  in  the  city,  in  the 
current  condition  of  politics,  is  worth  anything." 

A  gentle  nan  who  purchased,  a  short  time  before  the  war,  a  finely  wooded 
estate  in  a  rich  section  of  Louisiana,  for  $100  in  gold  per  acre,  informed  me  that 
he  had  tried  repeatedly  to  borrow  upon  the  security  of  that  estate,  and  that  he 
could  not  get  any  one  to  lend  a  sum  equivalent  to  one  dollar  per  acre  on  it. 

Some  three  years  ago  a  prominent  capitalist  was  addressed  by  a  citizen  of 
Louisiana,  who  represented  that  a  great  many  rich  estates  could  be  purchased  in 
various  sections  of  the  commonwealth  for  at  least  one-third  of  their  original 
value ;  and  added,  as  an  inducement  to  speedy  decision,  that  he  did  not  think 
property  would  ever  be  lower  in  Louisiana.  The  capitalist  replied  that  he 
differed  with  his  much  esteemed  friend ;  that  in  a  few  years  those  estates  would, 
by  the  various  derangements  consequent  on  the  then  predominant  legislation,  be 
reduced  to  almost  no  value  whatever,  and  that  he  was  therefore  determined 
to  wait. 

During  a  visit  to  New  Orleans,  in  March  of  1874,  my  attention  was  called  to 
a  number  of  notable  instances  of  the  rapid  decline  of  property.  One  gentleman 
pointed  out  a  house  which,  in  1868,  he  would  have  been  glad  to  purchase  for 
$12,000;  a  little  later  it  was  sold  for  $8,000;  then  for  $6,000,  and  now  no 
one  could  be  found  to  take  it  at  $4,000.  Many  houses  are  given  rent  free  to 
persons  who  will  occupy  them,  that  they  may  not  be  allowed  to  fall  into  decay. 

The  sheriff  is  the  prosperous  man  in  New  Orleans.  His  office  has  been 
made  worth  $60,000  yearly. 

The  annual  session  of  the  Legislature,  fortunately  limited  by  the  Constitution 
to  sixty  days,  is  a  terrible  trial.  The  state  government  cannot  be  depended 
upon.  Earnest  men,  on  the  conservative  side,  are  deterred  from  conciliatory 
action  by  the  insincerity  of  those  in  power.  At  one  time  the  dominant  party 
seemed  really  desirous  of  inaugurating  reform  in  the  management  of  certain 
affairs,  and  called  for  a  committee  of  investigation  to  be  composed  of  the  prop- 
erty-holders. But  as,  at  nearly  the  same  time,  it  voted  away  $500,000  worth 
of  State  bonds  for  a  doubtful  enterprise,  the  property- holders  could  not  be  made 
to  believe  that  there  was,  in  truth,  any  desire  for  "  retrenchment"  and  "  reform." 


EDUCATION      IN     LOUISIANA.  97 

Time  and  time  again  the  legislature  which  the  Federal  Government  placed  in 
power  in  Louisiana  has  sworn  in  as  members  m§n  whom  the  returning-boards 
did  not  even  pretend  had  been  elected ;  and  these  men  have  been  allowed  to  sit 
as  representatives  of  people  whom  they  have  never  seen. 

One  of  the  worst  features  of  the  situation  in  Louisiana  is  the  entire  absence 
of  the  intelligent  and  well-to-do  negroes  from  politics  there.  It  is  only  the  ras- 
cals and  the  dubious  who  get  into  power;  and  they  are  more  terrible  than  the 
white  rogues.  They  practice  all  the  vices  in  the  calendar;  they  take  the  thou- 
sands of  dollars  diverted  from  their  proper  channels,  and  lavish  them  upon 
abandoned  white  women ;  they  enrich  themselves  and  boast  of  it. 

The  present  condition  of  the  educational  system  of  Louisiana  is  encouraging, 
although  disfigured  by  evils  which  arise  from  the  political  disorganization.  The 
State  superintendent  of  education,  at  the  time  of  my  visit,  was  a  mulatto  gentle- 
man of  evident  culture — seeming,  indeed,  quite  up  to  the  measure  of  his  task,  if 
he  only  had  the  means  to  perform  it.  He  could  not  tell  me  how  many  schools 
were  in  operation  in  the  State ;  nor  how  much  the  increase  had  been  since 
the  war.  There  was,  he  explained,  the  greatest  difficulty  in  procuring  returns 
from  the  interior  districts,  even  the  annual  reports  being  forwarded  tardily,  or 
sometimes  not  at  all.  The  school-tax  has  heretofore  been  two  mills  on  the  dollar, 
but  it  is  to  be  raised  to  one-fourth  of  one  per  cent.  The  State  is  in  six  divisions, 
one  of  which  comprises  New  Orleans,  and  there  is  a  superintendent  for  each 
division. 

There  are  now  in  Louisiana  291,000  youth  between  the  ages  of  six  and 
twenty-one ;  and  it  is  fair  to  presume  that  at  least  one-half  of  them  are  children 
of  colored  parents,  since  the  population  of  Louisiana  is  pretty  equally  divided  into 
white  and  black.  The  Legislature  appropriates  half  a  million  dollars  yearly  for 
the  use  of  the  schools,  of  which  about  seven- eighths  is  annually  expended. 
There  are  a  few  mixed  schools  now  in  the  State,  although  the  mingling  of-  colors 
has  not  been  insisted  upon. 

Great  numbers  of  private  schools  have  sprung  into  existence,  especially  in 
New  Orleans,  where  the  predominant  religion  is  the  Catholic ;  and  the  Germans 
have  shown  their  fear  of  mixed  schools  by  establishing  special  schools  for  their 
own  children.  The  Catholic  clergy  in  New  Orleans  have  not  gone  so  far  as  to 
forbid  the  attendance  of  children  of  Catholic  parents  in  the  public  schools ;  but 
the  organ  of  that  clergy  announced,  some  time  since,  that  the  poverty,  and  not 
the  will  of  the  parties,  acceded  the  permission  to  attend  secular  schools.  Im- 
mense progress  has  certainly  been  made  since  the  war.  In  1868,  when  the  real 
work  of  school  reform  in  the  State  began,  there  was  no  supervision  whatever  exer- 
cised over  school  funds,  and  millions  of  dollars  were  uselessly  squandered.  There 
were  then  less  than  one  hundred  public  schools  in  the  entire  State.  But  it  was 
estimated  at  the  first  educational  convention  ever  held  in  Louisiana,  which  met  in 
New  Orleans,  in  1872,  that  there  were  at  that  time  1,100  schools  in  operation, 
with  nearly  100,000  pupils.  The  old  system,  or  lack  of  system,  had  had  most 
painful  results.  There  were  no  means  of  obtaining  proper  reports ;  there  was  no 
certainty  that  the  few  teachers  who  were  employed  did  their  duty. 


98  THE      SCHOOL-LAW THE      STATE      UNIVERSITY. 

The  present  school-law  is  well  adapted  to  the  condition  and  wants  of  the 
State.  There  is  one  ugly  fact  in  the  way  of  progress  in  the  interior  of  the 
commonwealth,  and  that  is,  as  asserted  by  the  superior  officials,  that  the  money 
appropriated  to  the  different  parishes  for  school  funds,  has,  in  many  cases, 
never  been  used  for  schools ;  and  prosecution  of  officers  supposed  to  have 
retained  that  money  is  of  but  small  avail.  There  are  ostensibly  parish  boards 
of  school  directors  in  office  in  every  section  of  the  State;  but  they  do  not  all 
perform  their  duty. 

The  school- law  provides  for  tne  maintenance  of  a  proper  normal  depart- 
ment; and  good  teachers  are  yearly  sent  out  therefrom.  New  Orleans  now  has 
about  seventy  public  schools,  and  a  little  more  than  $700,000  invested  in  school 
property.  The  teachers  in  those  schools  exclusively  attended  by  white  children 
are  all  white ;  in  the  few  mixed  schools  there  are  some  colored  teachers.  The 
superintendent  said  that  it  would  not  do  to  insist  upon  mixed  schools  in  remote 
districts,  as  the  people  would  in  that  case  refuse  to  have  any  school  at  all. 

The  Louisiana  State  University,  temporarily  located  at  Baton  Rouge  until  its 
new  buildings  at  Alexandria  are  completed,  is  a  struggling  institution,  which 
needs  and  merits  much  aid  from  richer  States ;  and  an  agricultural  college  and 
a  system  of  industrial  schools  have  been  projected.  The  colored  children  in  the 
public  schools  manifest  an  earnestness  and  aptitude  which  amply  demonstrates 
their  claim  to  be  admitted  to  them.  People  in  all  sections  have  ceased  grumbling 
at  the  "  school-house  taxes,"  and  that  in  itself  is  a  cheering  sign. 


IX. 


HO     FOR    TEXAS!     GALVESTON. 


ONE  of  the  saddest  sights  in  New  Orleans  or  Galveston  is  the  daily  arrival 
of  hundreds  of  refugees  from  the  older  Southern  States,  seeking  homes 
on  the  Texan  prairies.  The  flood  of  emigration  from  South  Carolina,  Alabama 
and  Georgia  is  formidable,  and  turned  the  tide  of  politics  in  Texas,  in  a  single 


year,  from  Republi- 
can flood  tO  DemO- 
Going  to  Texas,  era  tic  ebb.  Old 
men  and  little  children,  youths  and 
maidens,  clad  in  homespun,  crowd 
the  railway  cars,  looking  forward 
eagerly  to  the  land  of  promise.  The  ignorance  of  these  poor  people  with 
regard  to  the  geography  of  the  country  in  general,  is  dense.  "  I  never 
traveled  so  much  befo', "  is  a  common  phrase ;  "  is  Texas  a  might}-  long  ways 
off  yet  ?"  The  old  men,  if  one  enters  into  conversation  with  them,  will  regale 
him  with  accounts  of  life  in  their    homes  "befo'   the  surrender."     With  them, 


IOO  THE  ROUTE   FROM  NEW  ORLEANS  TO  TEXAS. 

everything  dates  from  the  war,  leaving  the  past  irrevocably  behind  its  yawning 
gulf,  while  in  front  there  is  only  poverty — or  flight. 

The  route  from  New  Orleans  to  Brashear  City  is,  in  the  delightful  months  of 
April  and  May,  one  of  the  most  beautiful  in  the  South.  The  railroad  which 
connects  at  Brashear  City  with  the  Morgan  steamers  sailing  to  Galveston,  and 
along  which  the  tide  of  emigration  constantly  flows,  traverses  weird  forests  and 
lofty  cane-brakes,  and  passes  over  bayous,  swamps,  and  long  stretches  of  sugar 
plantations. 

Crossing  the  Mississippi  by  the  great  railroad  ferry  to  Algiers,  the  traveler 
soon  leaves  behind  the  low,  green  banks,  studded  with  neat,  white  houses  embow- 
ered in  a  profusion  of  orange  groves ;  and  is  borne  out  of  sight  of  the  black 
lines  of  smoke  leTt  upon  the  cloudless  sky  by  the  funnels  of  the  river  steamers. 
He  passes  Bayou  des  Allemands,  and  a  low  country  filled  with  deep,  black  pools; 
hurries  across  the  reedy  and  saturated  expanse  of  Trembling  Prairie,  dotted 
with  fine  oaks ;  rattles  by  Raceland,  and  its  moist,  black  fields,  to  La  Fourche 
Bayou,  on  which  lies  the  pretty,  cultivated  town  of  Thibodeaux. 

He  next  passes  Chacahoula  swamp,  a  wilderness  of  shriveled  cypresses  and 
stagnant  water ;  Tigerville,  with  its  Indian  mounds ;  the  rich  Bceuf  country, 
along  the  banks  of  whose  lovely  bayou  lie  wonderful  sugar  lands,  once  crowded 
with  prosperous  planters,  but  now  showing  many  an  idle  plantation.  He  passes 
immense  groves,  from  the  boughs  of  whose  trees  thousands  of  Spanish  moss 
beards  are  pendent;  and  through  which  long  and  sombre  aisles,  like  those  of  a 
cathedral,  open  to  right  and  left.  He  wonders  at  the  presence  of  the  bearded 
moss  on  all  the  trees,  and  his  commercial  eye  perhaps  suggests  that  it  be  made 
available  in  upholstery ;  but  he  is  told  that  the  quaint  parasite  already  does  good 
service  as  the  scavenger  of  the  air. 

At  Brashear  City  he  finds  a  steamer  for  Texas  at  the  fine  docks  built  by  the 
enterprising  proprietor  of  the  "  Morgan  line,"  and  notes,  as  he  passes  out  to  the 
blue  waters  of  the  Gulf,  the  richness  of  the  vegetation  along  the  shores  of  the 
inlet.     An  afternoon  and  a  night — and  he  is  in  Galveston. 

The  coast  line  of  Texas,  bordering  upon  the  Gulf  of  Mexico  from  Sabine 
Pass  to  the  Rio  Grande, — from  the  Louisiana  boundary  to  the  hybrid,  pictur- 
esque territory  where  the  American  and  Mexican  civilizations  meet  and  conflict, 
is  richly  indented  and  studded  with  charming  bays.  Trinity,  Galveston,  West, 
Matagorda,  Espiritu  Santu,  Aransas,  and  Corpus  Christi  harbors,  each  and  all 
offer  varied  possibilities  for  future  commerce.  The  whole  coast,  extending 
several  hundred  miles,  is  also  bordered  by  a  series  of  islands  and  peninsulas,  long 
and  narrow  in  form,  which  protect  the  inner  low-lying  banks  from  the  high  seas. 

The  plains  extending  back  from  the  coast  in  the  valleys  of  the  Sabine,  the 
San  Jacinto  and  the  Colorado,  seem  in  past  centuries  to  have  formed  a  vast 
delta,  whose  summit  was  probably  near  the  Colorado,  and  whose  angles  were 
formed  by  the  Sabine  and  the  Nueces.  Great  horizons,  apparently  boundless  as 
the  sea,  characterize  these  plains ;  the  wanderer  on  the  Gulf  sees  only  the 
illimitable  expanse  of  wave  and  alluvial ;  the  eye  is  fatigued  by  the  immensity, 
and  gladly  seeks  rest  upon  the  lines  of  ancient  forest  which  cover  the  borders 


THE      MORGAN      STEAMSHIP      LINE GALVESTON.  IOI 

of  the  Colorado  and  the  Nueces.  Beyond  these  plains  comes  the  zone  of  the 
prairies,  whose  lightly  undulating  surface  extends  inland  as  far  as  the  Red  river, 
while  the  mountains  on  the  north-west  crown  the  fertile  knolls  of  rolling  country. 

These  mountains  are  portions  of  the  Sierra  Madre,  which  is  itself  but  a  spur 
from  the  grand  Andean  chain.  Running  to  the  north-west  in  the  State  of 
Coahuila  (once  a  portion  of  Texas),  the  Sierra  Madre  spur  bifurcates  to  enter  the 
Texas  of  the  present,  and  continues  in  a  north-westerly  direction,  under  the 
name  of  the  San  Saba,  in  whose  breasts  are  locked  the  rich  minerals  which  the 
Spaniard,  during  his  period  of  domination,  so  often  and  so  va.inly  strove  to 
unearth. 

The  Texan  coast  sweeps  downward  and  outward  by  a  wide  curve  to  the 
Mexican  boundary.  Approaching  it  from  the  sea,  the  eye  encounters  only  a 
low-lying  level  of  white  sand,  with  which,  however,  at  all  hours,  the  deep  colors 
of  the  gulf  are  admirably  contrasted. 

The  great  sea  highway  to  which  I  have  previously  alluded,  from  Brashear 
City,  on  Berwick's  Bay,  on  the  Louisiana  coast,  to  Galveston,  is  well  known  and 
fascinating  to  the  modern  traveler.  The  enterprise  and  liberal  expenditure 
of  a  citizen  of  New  York,  Mr.  Charles  Morgan,  has  covered  the  waves  of  this 
route  with  steamships,  which,  until  recently,  furnished  the  only  means  of  com- 
munication between  Texas  and  the  rest  of  the  United  States.  The  Morgan  Line 
was  not  merely  the  outgrowth  of  an  earnest  demand  ;  it  was  the  work  of  an 
adventurous  pioneer ;  and  although  its  importance,  in  view  of  the  grand  railroad 
development  of  Northern  Texas,  can  henceforth  be  but  secondary,  its  founder 
will  always  be  remembered  for  his  foresight  and  daring.  The  improvements  in 
the  channels  from  Berwick's  Bay  outward  are  also  the  work  of  the  owner  of  this 
line.  They  comprehend  the  dredging  of  a  great  bar  which  once  obstructed  the 
short  passage  to  the  Gulf,  and  when  completed  will  be  of  infinite  importance  to 
the  commerce  of  the  whole  south-west.  Thousands  of  tons  of  shells  have  been 
dragged  out  of  the  dark-blue  water  to  make  room  for  the  prows  of  the  Morgan 
fleet,  pointed  toward  Galveston  and  Indianola. 

And  what  is  Galveston  ?  A  thriving  city  set  down  upon  a  brave  little  island 
which  has  fought  its  way  out  of  the  depths  of  the  Gulf,  and  given  to  the  United 
States  her  noblest  beach,  and  to  Texas  an  excellent  harbor.  Seen  from  the  sea, 
when  approaching  under  the  fervid  light  of  a  Southern  dawn,  or  when  sailing 
away  from  it  in  the  white  moonlight,  so  intensely  reflected  on  the  sand,  it  is 
indeed  a  place  where 

"  Myrtle  groves 
Shower  down  their  fragrant  wealth  upon  the  waves 
Whose  long,  long  swell  mirrors  the  dark-green  glow 
Of  cedars  and  the  snow  of  jasmine  cups." 

It  is  a  city  in  the  sands ;  yet  orange  and  myrtle,  oleander  and  delicate  rose, 
and  all  the  rich-hued  blossoms  of  a  tropic  land,  shower  their  wealth  about  it.  In 
the  morning  the  air  is  heavy  with  the  perfume  of  blossoms ;  in  the  evening  the 
light,  to  Northern  eyes,  is  intense  and  enchanting. 


102 


THE      BEACH GALVESTON      ISLAND. 


Thirty- one  miles  of  picturesque  beach  are  constantly  laved  by  the  restless 
waters.  It  is  only  a  few  steps  from  an  oleander  grove  to  the  surf,  the  shell- 
strewn  strand,  and  the  dunes.  The  approach  from  the  mainland  will  instinctively 
remind  the  traveler  of  Venice.     A  great  bridge,  two  miles  in  length,  connects 

the  islet  with  the 
continent.  Dis- 
mantled fortifica- 
tions near  the 
bridge  show  one 
that  the  war 
reached  even  to 
the  Gulf;  and  the 
mass  of  low- 
lying,  white,  bal- 
conied houses 
forms  a  pleasant 
group. 

Much  of  the 
island  is  unkempt 
and  neglected- 
looking.       Cattle 

"It  is  only  a  few  steps  from  an  oleander  grove  to  the  surf."  ,  r  ^ 

wander  freely 
about.  There  are  a  few  market- gardens,  and  some  meat-packeries  in  the 
suburbs  of  the  city.  Galveston  itself,  however,  is  as  trim  and  elegant  as  any 
town  in  the  South.  The  business  quarter  looks  quaint  and  odd  to  strangers' 
eyes,  because  of  the  many  long  piers  and  jetties ;  the  mule-carts,  unloading 
schooners  anchored  lightly  in  the  shallow  waves ;  and  the  hosts  of  slouch- 
ing darkies,  shouting  and  dancing  as  they  move  about  their  tasks. 

The  "  Strand,"  the  main  business  thoroughfare,  has  been  twice  ruined  by  fire, 
but  has  sprung  up  again  into  quite  a  magnificence  of  shop  and  warehouse ;  and 
Tremont,  and  other  of  the  commercial  avenues,  boast  of  as  substantial  structures 
as  grace  the  elder  Northern  cities.  There  is  a  network  of  wharves  and  ware- 
houses, built  boldly  out  into  the  water,  in  a  manner  which  recalls  Venice  even 
more  forcibly  than  does  the  approach  from  the  mainland. 

The  heat  is  never  disagreeably  intense  in  Galveston ;  a  cool  breeze  blows 
over  the  island  night  and  day ;  and  the  occasional  advent  of  the  yellow-fever, — 
the  dread  intruder  who  mows  down  hundreds  of  victims, — is  a  mystery.  It 
comes,  apparently,  upon  the  wings  of  the  very  wind  which  puts  health  and  life 
into  every  vein ;  and  many  a  midsummer  is  rendered  memorable  by  its 
ravages. 

Yet  there  could  hardly  be  imagined  a  more  delightful  water-side  resort  than 
Galveston,  during,  at  least,  four  months  in  the  year.  My  first  visit  to  the  beach 
was  in  February,  and  the  air  of  Northern  June  fanned  the  waves.  The  winter 
months  could  certainly  be  delightfully  spent  in  Galveston ;  and  the  little  city  has 
built  a  splendid  hotel  as  a  seductive  bait  for  travelers. 


THE     HISTORY     OF     GALVESTON. 


I03 


Galveston  is  memorable  in  Texan  history  as  the  retreat  of  the  dread  pirates 
of  the  Gulf — the  smugglers  and  outlaws  of  Barataria.  Though  discovered  in 
1686  by  La  Salle,  it  remained  uninhabited  until  18 16,  when  Lafitte  and  his  pirate 
brethren  from  the  Louisiana  coast  tested  the  capacities  of  the  harbor,  and  shortly 
after  it  was  occupied  by  the  forces  of  the  "  Mexican  Republic."  Privateers 
went  out  from  the  bay  to  cruise  against  Spanish  commerce,  and  the  fleets  of 
Spain  were  swept  from  the  Gulf. 

The  island  also  became  a  depot  for  the  sale  of  negroes,  to  be  imported  into 
Louisiana,  the  native  African's  market  value  being  one  dollar  per  pound.  At 
one  time  the  followers  of  "  Lafitte,  the  Galveston  buccaneer,"  numbered  a  thou- 
sand refugees  from  justice.  Lafitte  was  appointed  "  governor  of  the  island  "  by 
the  Mexican  authorities,  who  cared  little  for  the  character  of  their  public  servants, 
provided  they  were  efficient. 

But  in  due  time  the  prince  of  pirates  was  compelled  by  the  Government  of 
the  United  States  to  leave  Galveston  forever,  as  his  followers  had  so  far  forgotten 
themselves  as  to  plunder  American  shipping.  The  island  again  became  a  waste, 
and  only  an  occasional  superstitious  hunter  for  the  spoils  of  the  pirates  visited 
the  sandy  shores. 

As  the  republic  of  Texas  grew  in  after  years,  however,  so  grew  Galveston. 
It  was  a  promising  town  before  the  late  war,  with  perhaps  ten  thousand  popula- 
tion. While  the  rude  interior  towns  were  still  in  their  infancy,  Galveston  was  a 
port  of  entry,  the  station  of  the  navies  of  the  little  republic,  and  the  scene  of 
many  courtly  festivities  in  honor  of  foreign  ambassadors. 

During  the  war  its  commerce  was,  of  course,  utterly  broken,  and  it  was  occu- 
pied in  turn  by  Union  and  Confederate  soldiers.  Latterly  it  has  assumed  a 
commercial  importance  which  promises  to  make  it  a  large  and  flourishing  city, 


The  mule-carts,  unloading  schooners  anchored  lightly  in  the  shallow  waves."     [Page  102.] 


104 


THE   TEXAS   COTTON   TRADE. 


although  it  has  many  rivals  in  the  field  whence  it  expects  to  draw  its  trade. 
The  cotton  factors  of  the  city  are  enthusiastic  in  their  belief  that  they  shall 
succeed  in  bringing  to  their  port  the  majority  of  the  cotton  grown  in  Texas,  but 
they  overlook  the  formidable  rivalry  of  St.  Louis.  The  capitalists  of  that  city 
intend  to  control  the  whole  cotton  crop  of  Northern  Texas,  bringing  it  into  their 
market  over  the  new  Cairo  and  Fulton  line  and  over  the  railroads  running 
through  Central  Northern  Texas;  and  in  case  the  New  Orleans,  Mobile  and 
Texas  railroad  should  connect  Houston  with  New  Orleans,  Houston  might  take 
the  remainder  of  the  cotton  crop,  diverting  it  from  the  Galveston  channel,  and 
throwing  it  into  the  New  Orleans  market.  Galveston  has  but  one  railroad  exit, 
the  line  leading  to  Houston,  where  all  the  railroads  of  the  grand  new  system 
will  centre.      Although  the  business   men  of  Galveston  are  confident  that  the 


"  Galveston  has  many  huge  cotton  presses  " 

cotton  crop  will  all  fall  into  their  hands,  those  of  Houston  think  differently. 
Galveston  has  many  huge  cotton  presses,  in  whose  sheds  thousands  of  bales 
lie   stored. 

It  is  to  be  hoped  that  such  a  large  proportion  of  the  twenty  millions  of  acres 
of  cotton-bearing  lands  in  Texas  will  speedily  come  under  cultivation  that  all  the 
channels  of  trade  will  be  filled  to  repletion.  The  freed  negroes,  who  are  through- 
out Texas  an  industrious  and  prosperous  class,  although,  of  course,  characterized 
by  the  failings  of  their  race,  and  the  crudities  consequent  on  their  sudden  change 
of  station,  are  extensively  engaged  in  the  culture  of  cotton.  The  negro  who  is 
fortunate  enough  to  have  secured  a  tract  of  land,  grows  all  the  cotton  he  can,  and 
if  he  would  take  the  necessary  pains  to  clean  and  prepare  it,  would  soon  enrich 
himself  in  the  profitable  culture. 


THE  EXPORT  OF  COTTON. 


I05 


The  lands  at  the  head  of  Galveston  Bay,  and  on  the  adjoining  San  Jacinto 
Bay,  as  well  as  all  the  lands  in  immediate  proximity  to  the  Gulf,  are  well 
adapted  to  the  culture  of  sea-island  cotton — equal  in  quality  to  the  best  grown 
upon  the  islands  along  the  South  Carolina  and  Georgia  coasts.  It  would  be  diffi- 
cult to  imagine  a  better  paying  culture  than  that  of  this  excellent  staple,  the 
yield  being  from  $200  to  $300  in  gold  per  acre.  The  alluvial  lands  along  the 
Gulf  demand  the  presence  of  the  Chinaman;  great  fortunes  lie  hidden  in  their  fiats. 

The  export  of  sea-island  cotton  is  trivial  as  yet,  but  growing  daily.  In  1870 
the  exports  amounted  to  $17,719;  in  1871,  to  $44,863,  and  in  1872,  to  $84,437. 
Some  of  the  exports  of  the  ordinary  upland  cotton  from  Galveston  since  the  war 
are  shown  in  the  appended  table : 


Year. 
1866 
1867 
1868 
1869 
1870 
I87I 
1872 
1873 


Bales.  Dollars. 

16,417 $2, 146,224 

66,271 6,730,257 

87,794 7.687,464 

84,485 9>997>66i 

*  144, 123 14,476,550 

■  • 233,737 16,060,794 

186,073 1 1,898,870 

333, 5°2 32,423,806 

The  commercial  year  begins  May  1st. 


The  total  amount  of  dutiable  and  free  imports  for  each  year  since  the 
re-establishment  of  business,  May  1st,  1866,  in  the  Galveston  Custom -House, 
until  December  31st,  1872,  is  as  follows:  1866,  $366,388;  in  1867,  $766,622; 
in  1868,  $251,052;  in  1869,  $276,588;  in  1870,  $774,918;  in  1871,  $1,586,408; 
and  in  1872,  $1,940,292. 

The  number  of  entrances  of  foreign  and  coastwise  vessels  in  Galveston  harbor 
yearly  varies  from  700  to  1,400.  Steamships  loaded  with  cotton  run  regularly 
between  Galveston  and  Liverpool ; 
and,  returning,  bring  out  English, 
Irish,  and  Scotch  emigrants,  giving 
them  credit  for  their  passage-money, 
and  binding  them  by  contract  to  work 
for  a  fixed  sum  for  a  certain  term  after 
their  arrival  in  Texas.  This  plan  has 
thus  far  succeeded  admirably,  and  is 
bringing  hundreds  of  worthy  families 
from  the  slums  of  English  cities  into 
the  inspiring  atmosphere  of  the  Texan 
uplands.  The  main  shipments  of 
cotton  are,  of  course,  to  Liverpool 
although  London,  Bremen,  and  Ham- 
burg receive  some  of  the  crop. 

There  are  now  fifteen  steamers  run- 
ning to  Berwick's  Bay;  eight  to  New 


io6 


COASTWISE      AND      FOREIGN      TRADE 


York ;  a  line  to  Baltimore ;  bayou  steamers  to  Houston,  and  river  steamers  from 
the  Trinity  and  the  Brazos.  The  steamship  line  between  New  York  and  Gal- 
veston carries  about  ninety-five  per  cent,  of  all  the  merchandise  sent  into  Texas 
from  New  York,  Philadelphia,  Boston  and  Baltimore.     The  foreign  trade  of  the 


"Primitive  enough  is  this  Texan  jail."     [Page  107.] 

port  is  increasing  with  wonderful  rapidity;  tallow  and  cotton-seed  oil-cake  are 
important  exports;  and  on  my  second  visit  to  Galveston  I  saw  the  famous 
steamer  "  Hornet"  loading  with  cattle  for  Havana.  It  is  proposed  to  supply  the 
West  Indian  market  hereafter  entirely  with  Texan  cattle,  the  transit  requiring 
only  three  days  ;  and  there  are  large  exports  of  hides  and  wool. 

The  imports  are  salt,  coffee,  crockery,  iron  and  tin,  and  best  of  all — though 
non-dutiable — a  steady  current  of  sturdy  Germans,  who  tame  the  wildness  of 
Texas  faster  than  the  natives  themselves  can  do  it.  Galveston  is  likely  to  remain 
the  best  coffee  market  in  the  United  States.  The  importation  of  lumber  from 
Florida,  Louisiana,  and  Northern  ports,  employs  a  large  number  of  vessels  yearly, 
for  Galveston  stands  in  a  timberless  region;  there  is  not  an  acre  of  forest  land  for 
miles  on  miles  around. 

Thus  much  for  the  present  commerce  of  Galveston ;  its  future  would  be  per- 
fectly certain  were  it  not  for  the  rivalry  forced  upon  neighboring  towns  by  the 
marvelously  rapid  development  of  transit  lines.  Very  little  fear  have  the  Gal- 
vestonians,  the  cheery  "sand-crabs,"  as  the  people  of  Houston  affectionately 
call  them,  of  being  "left  out  in  the  cold."  And  they  go  on  building  superb 
new  avenues,  planting  their  oleanders,  and  trellising  their  roses,  without  any 
worry  for  the  morrow.  The  rebound  since  the  war  has  certainly  been  surprising. 
Galveston  was  almost  depopulated  at  the  close  of  the  great  struggle,  hardly  two 
thousand  people  remaining  there.  Let  us  take  a  picture  or  two  from  the  life 
of  the  "  Island  City." 

Morning :  A  bright  sunlight  on  the  silver-rippling  water,  and  one  catches  the 
inspiring  breath  of  the  waves.     Yonder  is  a  mass  of  dense  foliage,  from  whose 


PICTURES      FROM      LIFE      IN      THE 


ISLAND      CITY. 


I07 


green  peer  out  faintest  red  and  purest  white,  the  color  of  the  blossoms  and  the 
gleam  of  the  house-walls.  Here  the  oleanders  have  arched  their  boughs  and 
made  a  shaded  walk ;  the  magnolia  towers  above  a  little  balconied  cottage,  on 
whose  gate  a  couple  of  half-naked  negro  children  are  swinging ;  a  mocking-bird 
is  imitating  the  strange  whir  of  the  insect-life  about  him ;  there  is  very  little  din 
or  rattle  of  carriages  or  drays ;  the  town  seems  to  have  wakened  lazily,  and  to 
be  lolling  in  the  sun-bath,  and  rejoicing  in  the  hints  of  the 

' '  Salt  and  spume  o'  the  sea  " 

which  drift  lightly  inland. 

At  the  doors  of  the  Custom-House  half-a-dozen  negroes  are  lying  with  their 
heads  upon  the  broad  steps,  yawning  and  joking;  at  the  long,  white-painted 
market-sheds,  the  market-men  and  women  have  done  their  shouting,  and  relapsed 
into  a  kind  of  contented  rest  as  they  feel  the  day's  heat  coming  on ;  under  the 
wooden  awnings  in  the  principal  avenues  of  lighter  trade  a  few  black-robed,  dark- 
eyed  ladies  pass  quietly  to  and  fro ;  and  from  the  sea  drifts  up  the  chant  of 
dusky  watermen  loading  their  mule-carts. 

Noon:  From  this  balcony  we  can  overlook  the  jail,  the  cathedral,  and  the  town 
beyond.  Primitive  enough  is  this  Texan  jail — a  common  two-story  brick  struc- 
ture— surrounded  with  a  high  wall,  garnished  with  cruel  glass,  set  in  cement. 
In  the  jail-yard  you  may  see  still  life — very  still  life.  The  jailer  has  just  let 
the  prisoners  out  from  their  steaming  ovens,  and  they  are  stretched  on  the  scant 
grass,  a  motley  crew — an  old  man,  with  a  hang-dog  look,  and  eyes  which  seem 
to  fear  any  one's  face  as  he  blinks  in  the  sun's  glare ;  a  frowsy,  mean  negro  girl, 
slouched  down  upon  a  water-butt,  smoking  a  corn-cob  pipe ;  and  half-a-dozen 
stout  black  men,  hideous  in  rags  and  dirt. 

At  the  jail's  front  there  is  a  little  tower  and  a  kind  of  mediaeval  gate,  where 

the   prisoners    sometimes  huddle   to  watch  a  passing  circus  or  to  note  the  ad- 

^ggjggjL—^^.  . — -  vent   of  a   new  prisoner.     Invitingly 

near  stands  the  Court-House,  whence 
now  and  then  issue  legal-looking 
gentlemen,  furiously  masticating  to- 
bacco. 

Beyond  the  Cathedral,  with  its 
graceful  group  of  roofs,  there  is  a 
stretch  of  dusty  roadway,  and,  farther 
still,  a  herd  of  young  horses  quietly 
feeding.  Yon  dusky  horseman  means 
to  bring  them  in.  Ha !  Like  the 
wind  they  fly — every  nerve  and  sinew 
strained.  Escaped?  No:  The 
black  centaur  speeds  beyond  them 
like  a  flash,  and  the  homeward  race 
begins — wild  but  decisive.  Here 
ihc  < :,iic  c^edi-a!       u  and  there    dead    cattle    lie  scattered. 


io8 


SUNSET     ON     THE     BEACH. 


Here  is  the  very  aspect  of  the  San  Antonio  plains  within  a  mile  of  the  principal 
seaport  of  Texas. 

Evening :  The  tide  is  out,  and  you  may  promenade  the  Gulf  shore  along  a 
hard,  unyielding  track  left  by  the  receded  water,  and  watch  the  negro  fisherman 
as  he  throws  his  line  horizonward,  to  see  it  swirl  and  fall  in  the  retreating  surf  to 
come  up  laden  with  scaly  treasure.  The  blue  of  the  water,  the  dark  of  the 
seemingly  endless  strip  of  beach,  the  faint  crimson,  or  the  purple,  or  the  gold  of 
the  sunset  sky,  form  delicious  contrasts.  A  few  sails  steal  seaward  like  unquiet 
ghosts ;  miles  away,  at  a  rugged  promontory,  where  the  tide  is  beginning  to  set 
about  and  come  in  again,  the  sky  seems  to  have  come  down  to  kiss  the  sea, 


"Watch  the  negro  fisherman  as  he  throws  his  line  horizonward." 

so  exquisitely  do  colors  of  heaven  and  water  blend ;  the  long  line  of  carriages 
hurries  cityward ;  lights  seem  to  spring  from  the  very  bosom  of  the  sea,  so  low 
and  trustingly  does  the  little  islet-town  lie  on  the  Gulf's  surface ;  the  orange- 
trees  and  the  fig-shrubs  send  forth  a  delicate  perfume  in  the  cool  air  of  the 
twilight. 

The  depth  of  water  on  the  various  bars  at  the  ports  along  the  Texan  coast  is 
so  shallow  that  most  of  them  can  never  receive  the  largest  shipping ;  but  the 
plan  of  Captain  Howells,  the  department  engineer,  for  the  improvement  of  the 
entrance  to  Galveston  Bay,  is  an  excellent  one,  and  contemplates  the  admission 
of  vessels  drawing  eighteen  feet  of  water. 


THE   CANAL  PROTECT SOCIETY THE  "NEWS."  IOO, 

The  merchants  of  Galveston  will  hardly  be  contented  until  they  have  Liver- 
pool ships  of  largest  draught  at  their  very  docks.  They  have  built  a  wharf  rail- 
road which  enables  the  loading  of  vessels  directly  from  the  cars,  avoiding  tedious 
transfers.  They  are  also  planning  for  a  canal  to  connect  the  Rio  Grande  with 
the  Mississippi.  This  canal  would  be  of  immense  advantage  to  South-western 
Louisiana  and  South-eastern  Texas ;  and  it  is  estimated  that  it  would  bring  into 
cultivation  nearly  4,000,000  acres  of  land  adapted  to  the  raising  of  sea-island 
cotton.  But  this  is  one  of  the  measures  which  will  probably  come  with  the 
"  moving   of  the    Mexican    frontier." 

Society  in  Galveston  is  good,  cultured  and  refined ;  and  the  standard  of 
education  is  excellent,  judging  from  the  large  number  of  institutions  of  learning 
in  the  city.  The  Collegiate  Institution,  the  Catholic  College,  the  Convent  for 
Women,  the  Galveston  Female  Seminary,  the  Medical  College,  and  several 
German  schools,  all  have  fine  reputations.  The  new  Methodist  and  Episcopal 
churches,  and  the  Cathedral  are  the  finest  religious  edifices  in  the  State. 

On  Tremont  street  stands  the  beautiful  Opera  House,  where  is  also  located 
the  office  of  The  Galveston  Nevus.  This  paper,  founded  by  Willard  Richardson, 
is  by  far  the  ablest  Democratic  journal  in  Texas,  and  takes  high  rank  in  the 
South-west.  Its  founder  has  been  conspicuous  in  aiding  by  word  and  work, 
the  upbuilding  of  Texas,  and  through  a  long  series  of  years,  has  published  the 
"Texas  Almanac,"  a  voluminous  and  faithful  record  of  the  great  common- 
wealth's progress. 

Galveston  also  has  its  Club,  "The  Gulf  City,"  frequented  by  many  of  the 
prominent  citizens  of  the  State.  Few  cities,  with  a  population  of  twenty-five 
or  thirty  thousand  are  more  spirited ;  though  manufacturing,  as  a  solid  basis 
is,  nevertheless,  a  supreme  need. 


X. 


A      VISIT     TO      HOUSTON. 


THE  need  of  manufactures  is,  indeed,  strongly  felt  throughout  Texas.  In 
nearly  every  county  farmers  and  merchants  are  paying  treble  and  quadru- 
ple the  prices  they  can  afford  to  pay  for  goods  brought  thousands  of  miles, 
whereas,  local  investment  in  manufacturing  establishments  would  enable  them  to 
multiply  facilities  for  agricultural  development,  and  for  the  comfort  and  culture  of 
which  the  interior  is  now  so  barren. 

Now  that  transit  facilities  have  come,  such  an  outgrowth  of  manufactures 
may  be  looked  for. 

The  wheat  region  of  Texas  comprehends  40,000  square  miles.  .What  millions 
of  barrels  of  flour,  if  proper  mills  were  at  hand,  might  be  placed  in  the  market 
two  months  in  advance  of  consignments  from  the  West! 

Houston  has  already  begun  the  manufacture  of  cotton  cloth,  and  applicants 
for  situations  in  the  mills  are  so  numerous  that  the  employers  are  embarrassed  by 
them.     At  Hempstead,  New  Braunfels,  and  the  State  Penitentiary,  this  manufac- 


"The  cotton  train  is  already  a  familiar  spectacle  on  all  the  great  trunk  lin^s." 

ture  is  prosperous  ;  yet  I  doubt  if  more  than  $1, 000,000  is  thus  invested  in  the 
whole  State.  The  people  of  Texas  are  learning  that  they  have  in  their  very 
midst  all  the  elements  necessary  to  support  life  and  make  it  comfortable  and 
even  luxurious;  and  they  are  making  a  genuine  effort  to  secure  and  hold 
Northern  and  Western  capital. 

In  a  few  years  cotton  and  woolen  mills  will  rapidly  multiply  in  Texas ;  labor 
will  be  cheap,  because  of  the  cheapness  of  provisions  and  the  ease  with  which  life 
is  sustained ;  and  Northern  capital  will  find  one  of  its  most  profitable  fields  in  the 
very  region  which,  ten  years  ago,  was  hardly  counted  among  the  cotton  and 
woolen   producing    sections    of  the    South.      The    "cotton    train"    is    already  a 


REMINISCENCES     OF      HOUSTON     AS     A     CAPITAL.  Ill 

familiar  spectacle  on  all  the  great  trunk  lines.  It  is  carefully  guarded  against 
danger  from  fire  by  vigilant  negroes,  and  when  seen  at  a  distance,  crawling 
across  the  level  lands,  looks  like  some  huge  reptile,  from  whose  nostrils  issue 
smoke  and  steam. 

Houston  is  one  of  the  most  promising  of  Texan  towns.  It  lies  fifty  miles 
inland  from  Galveston,  on  Buffalo  Bayou,  and  is  now  the  central  point  of  a  com- 
plicated and  comprehensive  railway  system.  It  was  christened  after  the  resolute, 
strong-hearted  and  valiant  man  whose  genius  so  aided  in  creating  an  independent 
Texas,  and  it  cherishes  his  memory  tenderly.  It  is  the  ambitious  rival  of 
Galveston,  and  because  nature  has  endowed  its  streets  with  unusual  capacity 
for  muddiness,  Galveston  calls  its  inhabitants  "mud-turtles."  A  free  exchange 
of  satiric  compliments  between  the  two  infant  cities  is  of  frequent  occurrence. 

In  the  days  of  the  Texan  republic,  when  Houston  was  the  capital,  it  was  an 
important  point.  Only  fifteen  miles  below  the  present  town  limits,  on  the  banks 
of  the  picturesque  bayou,  that  republic  was  born ;  for  the  travail  of  San  Jacinto 
certainly  brought  it  to  the  light.  Audubon,  the  naturalist,  has  left  a  curious 
memorial  of  Houston  as  it  was  during  the  republic.  The  residence  of  President 
Houston  was  a  typical  Southern  log- cabin,  two  large  frame- works,  roofed,  and 
with  a  wide  passage-way  between.  Audubon  found  the  President  dressed  in  a 
fancy  velvet  coat,  and  trowsers  trimmed  with  broad  gold  lace,  and  was  at  once 
invited  to  take  a  drink  with  him.  All  the  surroundings  were  uncouth  and  dirty, 
in  Audubon's  eyes ;  but,  he  did  not  fail  to  recognize  that  the  stern  men  who  had 
planted  a  liberty  pole  on  that  desolate  prairie  in  memory  of  the  battle  of  San 
Jacinto  would  make  Texas  an  autonomy.  They  did  their  rough  work  in  their 
rough  way;  but  it  will  stand  for  all  time.  The  old  "Capitol,"  now  a  hotel, 
stands  on  the  main  street  of  modern  Houston.  It  is  a  plain  two-story  wooden 
structure,  painted  white;  and  contains  the  "Senate  Chamber"  which  once 
resounded  to  the  eloquence  of  the  early  heroes. 

Houston  was  a  little  settlement  which  had  sprung  up  near  the  town  of  Harris- 
burg,  the  scene  of  many  dramatic  events  when  the  republic  was  struggling  with 
•Santa  Anna  for  its  life;  and  the  Texan  Congress  first  met  there  in  1837. 
There,  too,  was  finally  and  definitely  established  the  first  Texan  newspaper, 
The  Houston  Telegraph,  an  adventurous  sheet  which  had  been  forced  by  Mexican 
invasion  to  flee  from  town  to  town,  until  Houston's  victory  confirmed  its  right  to 
live.  To-day  it  is  one  of  the  institutions  of  Texas ;  has  been  edited  by  men  of 
rare  culture  ;  showed  wonderful  enterprise  in  obtaining  news  during  the  war  of 
secession,  and  is  a  credit  to  the  State. 

My  first  visit  to  Houston  was  in  winter.  It  was  late  at  night  when,  after  a 
long  ride  from  the  frontier  of  the  Indian  territory,  where  snow  was  still  on  the 
ground,  I 

"Dropt  into  that  magic  land." 

Stepping  from  the  train,  I  walked  beneath  skies  which  seemed  Italian.  The 
stillness,  the  warmth,  the  delicious  dreaminess,  the  delicate  languor  were 
most    intoxicating.      A    faint    breeze,    with    a   hint    of    perfume    in    it,    came 


I  12 


BUFFALO  BAYOU A  NORTHER. 


through  the  lattice  of  my  window  at  the  hotel.  The  magnolias  sent  their 
welcome;  the  roses,  the  dense  beds  of  fragrant  blossoms,  exhaled  their 
greeting.  Roses  bloom  all  winter,  and  in  the  early  spring  and  May  the 
gardens  are  filled  with  them. 

The  bayou  which  leads  from  Houston  to  Galveston,  and  is  one  of  the 
main  commercial  highways  between  the  two  cities,  is  overhung  by  lofty  and 
graceful  magnolias ;    and  in    the  season   of  their  blossoming,  one  may  sail  for 

miles  along  the 
channel  with  the 
heavy,  passionate 
fragrance  of  the 
queen  flower  drift- 
ing about  him. 

Houston  is  set 
down  upon  prairie 
land;  but  there  are 
some  notable  nooks 
and  bluffs  along 
the  bayou,  whose 
channel  barely 
admits  the  passage 
of  the  great  white 
steamer  which  plies 
to  and  from  the 
coast.  This  bayou 
Houston  hopes  one 
day  to  widen  and 
dredge  all  the  way 
to  Galveston ;  but 
its  prettiness  and 
romance  will  then 
be  gone. 

On  the  morn- 
ing of  my  arrival 
I  was  inducted  into 
the  mysteries  of  a 
"Norther,"  which 
came     raving    and 


"There  are  some  notable  nooks  and  bluffs  along  the  bayou." 


tearing  over  the  town,  threatening,  to  my  fancy,  to  demolish  even  the  housetops. 
Just  previous  to  the  outbreak,  the  air  was  clear  and  the  sun  was  shining,  although 
it  was  cold,  and  the  wind  cut  sharply.  This  "dry  Norther"  was  the  revulsion 
after  the  calm  and  sultry  atmosphere  of  the  previous  day.  A  cloud-wave,  like  a 
warning  herald, .  rose  up  in  the  north,  and  then  the  Norther  himself 

"  Upon  the  wings  of  mighty  winds 
Came  flying  all  abroad." 


HOUSTON      AND      ITS      PEOPLE 


113 


It  was  glorious,  exhilarating,  and — icy.  Suddenly  the  cloud  vanished ;  only 
a  thin  mist  remained,  and  after  his  brief  reign  of  a  brace  of  hours,  the  Norther  was 
over.  He  is  the  physician  of  malarious  districts,  from  time  to  time  purging  them 
thoroughly.  Sometimes  he  blows  down  houses,  trees,  and  fences,  forcing  the 
beasts  on  the  plains  to  huddle  together 
for  safety;  rarely,  however,  in  his  cold- 
est and  most  blustering  moods,  bring- 
ing the  mercury  of  the  thermometer 
below  twenty-five  degrees. 

Houston  is  well  laid  out,  and  grows 
rapidly,  prosperous  business  houses 
lining  its  broad  Main  street.  The 
head-quarters  of  the  Masonic  lodges 
of  the  State  are  there ;  the  annual  State 
Fair,  which  brings  together  thousands 
of  people  from  all  the  counties,  every 
May,  is  held  there;  and  the  Germans, 
who  are  very  numerous  and  well-to-do 
in  the  city,  have  their  Volks-fests  and 
beer-absorbings,   when   the    city    takes 

On  an  absolutely  Teutonic    air.  "The  Head-quarters  of  the  Masonic  Lodges  of  the  State." 

The  'colored  folk  are  peaceable  and  usually  well-behaved ;  they  have  had 
something  to  do  with  the  city  government  during  the  reconstruction  era,  and  the 
supervisor  of  streets,  and  some  members  of  the  city  council,  at  the  time  of  my 
sojourn  there,  were  negroes.  The  railroads  are  hastening  Houston's  prosperity. 
The  quiet  inhabitants  who  came  to  the  town  a  quarter  of  a  century  ago,  and  who, 
frightened  by  the  fancied  perils  of  the  Gulf,  have  never  since  been  back  to  "  the 
States,"  hear  of  the  route  from  "  Houston   to  St.   Louis  in  sixty  hours,"  with 


'The  railroad  depots  are  everywhere  crowded  with  negroes,  immigrants,  tourists  and  speculators."      [Page  114.] 


H4 


HOUSTON      AS      A      RAILWAY      CENTRE. 


superstitious  awe.  It  opens  a  new  country  to  them.  Northern  Texas,  even, 
seems  to  them  like  a  far-off  world.  They  hardly  realize  that  within  twenty-four 
hours'  ride  a  new  Texas  is  springing  up,  which,  in  commercial  glory  and  power, 
will  far  surpass  the  old. 

The   future    commercial    importance   of   Houston    can    readily   be    seen    by 
examining  its  location  with  regard  to  railway  lines.     The  Houston  and  Texas 

Central  connects  it  by  a  direct  line 
with  Denison  in  Northern  Texas,  with 
the  Missouri,  Kansas  and  Texas  rail- 
way through  the  Indian  Territory  and 
South-western  Missouri,  and  thence  by 
the  Missouri  Pacific  with  St.  Louis. 
The  Houston  and  Great  Northern 
route,  with  which  the  "International" 
road  has  been  consolidated  (the  united 
lines  taking  as  a  new  title  the  "  Inter- 
national and  Great  Northern"),  gives  a 
through  route  from  Columbia  near  the 
coast  to  -Houston,  thence  to  Palestine 
and  Longview  in  Northern  Texas,  and 
over   the    "Texas    and    Pacific,"    via 

The  New  Market — Houston.     TPage  115.]  -nyr         1      11  .      t>  1  ,1        ji     1 

1  Marshall  to  1  exarkana,  on  the  Arkansas 

border.  There  it  connects  with  the  new  Cairo  and  Fulton  and  Iron  Mountain 
route  to  St.  Louis.  The  Texas  and  Pacific  road  also  gives  it  connection  with 
Shreveport  and  with  the  road  projected  from  that  point  across  Northern  Louisiana 
to  Vicksburg  in  Mississippi.  Houston  is  connected 
with  Galveston  by  the  Galveston,  Houston  and 
Henderson  road,  now  under  the  control  of  Thomas 
W.  Pierce  of  Boston,  who  is  also  building  the  Gal- 
veston, Harrisburg  and  San  Antonio  road,  now  com- 
pleted to  within  forty  miles  of  San  Antonio.  The 
extension  of  the  New  Orleans,  Mobile  and  Texas 
railroad  through  Louisiana  to  the  Texan  border  will 
be  of  immense  advantage  to  Houston. 

At  the  time  of  my  visit  there  were  about  1,100 
miles  of  completed  railroad  in  Texas;  and  the  pro- 
jected routes,  and  surveys,  indicated  a  determination 
to  build  at  least  as  many  more  lines,  opening  up  the 
whole  of  Northern  Louisiana,  Texas  and  Arkansas. 
Although  the  roads  have  been  laid  down  with  sur- 
prising rapidity,  they  are  generally  good,  and  bright 
little  towns  are  springing  up  at  all  the  junctions  and 
termini.  The  railroad  depots  are  everywhere  crowded  || 
with    negroes,   immigrants,  tourists,    and   speculators. 

T-i         i         j  rjiTT  j  t>  /-  i" The  ragged  urchin  with  his  saucy 

lhe  head-quarters  of  the  Houston  and  lexas  Central,  face."   [Page  115. j 


MANUFACTURES SOCIETY. 


115 


and  of  the  International  and  Great  Northern  roads,  are  at  Houston.  The  former 
route,  of  which  William  E.  Dodge,  of  New  York,  is  president,  was  chartered 
in  1848,  and  had  built  eighty  miles  of  its  line  before  the  war.  All  the  rest  has 
been  done  since  1861,  and  it  now  stretches,  340  miles  from  Houston  to  the  Red 
river,  115  miles  from  Hempstead  to  Austin,  the  Texan  capital,  and  45  miles  from 
Bremond  to  Waco,  one  of  the  most  promising  towns  of  the  northern  section. 
Galusha  A.  Grow,  the  noted  Pennsylvania  politician,  has  taken  up  his  abode 
in  Texas,  and  presides  over  the  destinies  of  the  International  and  Great 
Northern  railroad. 

Thus  connected  with  the  outer  world,  Houston  grows  daily  in  commercial 
importance,  and  should  be  made  a  prominent  manufacturing  centre.  At  present, 
however,  there  are  only  the  Eureka  and  Houston  City  cotton  mills,  running  a  few 
thousand  spindles ;  the  various  railroad  machine  and  repair  shops ;  a  fine  new 
market  and  opera-house  combined ;  a  few  brick  yards,  beef  packeries,  and  foun- 
dries.    In  the  vicinity,  among  the  pineries  along  the  bayou,  there  are  numbers 


r  #'  j(Sfcm 


"The  negro  on  his  dray,  racing  good-humoredly  with  his  fellows."     [Page  116.] 


of  steam  saw-mills,  which  furnish  lumber  to  be  worked  into  the  "saloons," 
hotels,  and  shops  of  the  ambitious  new  towns  in  the  recently  opened  northern 
region. 

There  is  a  frankness  and  cordiality  about  the  society  of  Houston  which  is 
refreshing  to  one  coming  from  the  more  precise  and  cautious  East ;  the  manners 
of  the  people  are  simple,  courteous,  delightful ;  there  are,  in  the  little  city,  many 
families  of  culture  and  social  distinction,  whose  hospitality  renders  a  sojourn 
among  them  memorable.  The  Texan  of  the  South  is,  if  possible,  possessed  of 
more  State  pride  than  his  brother  of  Northern  Texas:  he  is  never  tired  of 
declaiming  of  the  beauties  of  the  climate,  and  is  extremely  sensitive  to  criticism. 
Above  all,  do  not  tell  the  Texan  maiden  that  her  land  is  not  the  fairest ;  for  the 
women  of  this  Southern  commonwefclth  are  even  more  idolatrous  of  their  beau- 
tiful homes  than  are  the  men.  There  is  a  touch  of  defiance  in  the  loving  manner 
with  which  they  linger  over  the  praise  of  Texas ;  they  talk  best  and  look  prettiest 
when  they  are  praising  "stars  which  Northern  skies  have  never  known."  They 
show  the  same  content  with  their  own  section  as  is  found  in  France,  and  a  leaning 


Il6  TYPES      FROM      NEGRO-LIFE. 

toward  incredulity  if  one  speaks  of  landscapes  more  perfect  or  of  flowers  more 
rare  than  those  of  the  "  Lone  Star  State ! " 

The  street  life  is  interesting ;  the  negro  on  his  dray,  racing  good-humoredly 
with  his  fellows ;  the  ragged  urchin  with  his  saucy  face  and  his  bundle  of  mag- 
nolia-blossoms;  and  the  auctioneer's  "young  man,"  with  mammoth  bell  and 
brazen  voice,  are  all  interesting  types,  which,  as  the  reader  will  observe,  the 
genial  and  careful  artist  has  faithfully  reproduced. 


"The  auctioneer's  young  man." 


XI. 


PICTURES      FROM      PRISON      AND      FIELD. 


ABOUT  fifteen  miles  from  Houston,  on  the  banks  of  the  bayou,  and  upon  a 
dull,  uninteresting  plain,  is  the  site  of  the  famous  battle  of  San  Jacinto. 
The  character  of  Houston  who  fought  it,  annihilating  a  Mexican  force  more  than 
twice  as  large  as  his  own,  and  capturing  the  redoubtable  Santa  Anna,  is,  and 
always  will  be,  the  subject  of  much  heated  discussion  in  Texas. 

Few  men  have  ever  left  such  firm  friends  and  such  implacable  enemies. 
There  are  two  versions  of  every  episode  of  Texan  history  with  which  he  was 
connected,  his  enemies  invariably  representing  him  as  a  man  of  bad  and  design- 
ing nature,  without  special  ability,  while  his  friends  magnify  the  real  excellence 
of  his  character  into  exalted  heroism. 

"Sam  Houston"  was  a  man  of  extraordinary  merit,  sternness,  strength  of  will, 
and  was  possessed  of  a  foresight  quite  beyond^  the  ordinary  range.  He  was  a 
Virginian  by  birth,  the 
hardy  son  of  hardier  and 
noble  parents,  going  in  his 
youth  with  his  widowed 
mother  to  Tennessee,  then 
the  boundary  between  the 
white  man  and  the  Cherokee 
Indian.  His  education  was 
slight,  and,  being  refused, 
when  at  school,  the  privilege 
of  learning  Greek,  which  he 
desired  after  reading  a  trans- 
lation of  the  Iliad,  he  swore 
that  he  would  never  recite 
another  lesson,  and  kept  his 
word. 

He  crossed  the  Tennessee 
river  and  joined  the  Indians, 
remaining  with  them  until 
his  manhood.  Some  time 
later  he  distinguished  him- 
self in  the  war  against  the 
Creeks,  and  in  1823  was 
elected   to   C  o  n  g  r  e  s  s    from  Sam  Houston. 


Il8  SAM      HOUSTON      AND      HIS      BATTLES. 

Tennessee.  An  unfortunate  marriage  seems  finally  to  have  decided  his  career. 
While  governor  of  Tennessee,  in  1829,  he  suddenly  separated  from  his  newly 
married  wife,  resigned  his  high  office,  and  returned  to  his  friends  the  Cherokees. 

After  remaining  with  them  for  some  years  he  again  mingled  with  white  men, 
and  in  1833,  entering  Texas  politics,  leaped  to  the  front,  became  the  commander- 
in-chief  of  the  Texan  armies,  and,  in  the  fase  of  the 
determined  opposition  of  an  empire  of  8,000/000 
of   people    established    the    independence    of   the    State. 

There  is  but  little  of  interest  on  the  battle-ground 
of  San  Jacinto  to-day.     The  ride  down  the  bayou 
from  Houston  is  delightful ;  but,  arriving  at   the     M 
plain,  one  sees  only  a  dreary  ex-    jjjljjj 
panse,  and  the  line  of  rising  ground    §1 
where,  on  the  21st  of  April,  1836, 
the  Texans  established  their  camp. 
On  that  field,  with  his  little  band 
of  war-worn  Texans,  General  Hous- 
ton made  his  final  stand  against  the 
formidable  forces  of   Santa  Anna. 
Suddenly  rallying  his    almost  ex- 

i,j  11.  1  j_l_  View  on  the  Trinity  River. 

hausted  men,  he  charged  upon  the 

enemy,  smote    them    hip    and    thigh,    trampled    them    into    the    morasses    and 

bayous,    and   terribly    avenged    the    Alamo,    and    its    kindred    massacres. 

The  Texans  engaged  in  the  battle  numbered  783,  and  the  Mexicans  lost  630 
killed  !  The  next  day  Santa  Anna  was  found  lying  prone  in  the  grass  near  the 
field  of  battle, —  his  disgraced  head  covered  with  a  blanket, — and  was  made 
prisoner.     Texas  was  effectually  wrested  from  the  cruel  grasp  of  Mexico. 

Houston  possessed  remarkable  eloquence  and  great  magnetic  power.  His 
speech  had  a  certain  majesty  about  it  which  was  in  itself  convincing  to  the  popu- 
lar ear.  A  man  of  many  faults,  he  was  full  of  the  pride  and  joy  of  life,  although 
at  times  intemperate  and  choleric.  There  are  many  traditions  in  Houston  of  his 
fondness  for  gaming,  his  adventures  after  drinking  freely,  and  his  power  of  control 
over  others.  When  the  late  war  came  he  stood  a  magnificent  bulwark  against 
the  waves  of  secession  and  indecision,  and  always  spoke  his  mind.  Never,  in  the 
maddest  moments,  was  he  denounced ;  his  person  and  his  opinions  were  held 
sacred,  and  he  died  peacefully  at  Huntsville  before  the  great  struggle  was  ended. 
In  the  various  portraits  extant  of  him  there  is  as  much  difference  as  in  the 
opinions  of  his  friends  and  enemies.  The  most  authentic  gives  him  a  keen, 
intellectual  face,  somewhat  softened  from  its  original  determination  by  age  and 
repose,  but  emphatically  a  manly  and  powerful  one. 

The  courtesy  of  President  Grow,  of  the  "International  and  Great  Northern" 
railroad,  placed  a  special  train  at  the  disposition  of  the  artist  and  myself  during 
our  stay  in  Houston,  and  we  visited  the  banks  of  that  charming  stream,  the 
Trinity  river,  and  the  fertile  lands  beside  it;  then  turning  aside  to  look  at 
the  great  State  Penitentiary,  where  nearly  a  thousand  convicts  are  registered, 


THE      CONVICT     TRAIN PRISONERS        LABOR. 


II9 


more  than  half  of  whom  are  employed,  like  galley  slaves,  as  hewers  of  wood 
and  stone  on  the  railroads  and  highways. 

The  sight  of  the  "convict  train"  is  one  of  the  experiences  of  Texan  travel 
which  still  clings  like  a  horrid  nightmare  in  my  memory.  To  come  upon  it 
suddenly,  just  at  twilight,  as  I  did,  at  some  lonely  little  station,  when  the  abject, 
cowering  mass  of  black  and  white  humanity  in  striped  uniform  had  crouched 
down  upon  the  platform  cars.;  to  see  the  alert  watchmen  standing  at  each  end  of 
every  car  with  their  hands  upon  their  cocked  and  pointed  rifles;  to  see  the  relaxed 
muscles  and  despairing  faces  of  the  overworked  gang,  was  more  than  painful. 

Once,  when  we  met  this  train,  a  gentleman  recognized  an  old  servant,  and  cried 
out  to  him,  "  What,  Bill,  are  you  there  ?"  and  the  only  answer  was  a  shrinking 
of  the  head,  and  a  dropping  of  the   under  jaw  in  the  very  paralysis  of  shame. 


"We  frequently  passed  large  gangs  of  the  convicts  chopping  logs  in  the  forest  by  the  roadside."    [Page  120.] 

The  convict  labor  is  contracted  for,  and  is  of  great  value  in  the  building  of 
the  railways  and  the  clearing  of  forests.  As  a  rule,  the  men  are  worked  from 
dawn  to  dark,  and  then  conveyed  to  some  near  point,  to  be  locked  up  in  cars  or 
barracks  constructed  especially  for  them.  They  are  constantly  watched,  working 
or  sleeping;  and  the  records  of  the  Penitentiary  show  many  a  name  against 
which  is  written,  "  Killed  while  trying  to  escape." 


120  THE      PENITENTIARY AN      INDIAN      PRISONER. 

We  frequently  passed  large  gangs  of  the  convicts  chopping  logs  in  the  forest 
by  the  roadside ;  they  were  ranged  in  regular  rows,  and  their  axes  rose  and  fell 
in  unison.  When  they  had  finished  one  piece  of  work,  the  stern  voice  of  the 
supervisor  called  them  to  another,  and  they  moved  silently  and  sullenly  to  the 
indicated  task.  In  the  town  where  the  Penitentiary  is  located,  it  is  not  unusual 
to  see  convicts  moving  about  the  streets,  engaged  in  teaming,  carpentry,  or 
mason  work ;  these  are  commonly  negroes,  sent  to  the  Penitentiary  for  trivial 
offences,  and  denominated  "trusties."  Sambo  and  Cuffee  have  found  the  way 
of  the  transgressor  unduly  hard  in  Texas  and  most  of  the  Southern  States,  since 
the  war  liberated  them.  The  pettiest  larceny  now  entitles  them  to  the  State's 
consideration,  and  the  unlucky  blackamoor  who  is  misty  as  to  the  proper  owner- 
ship of  a  ragged  coat,  or  a  twenty-five  cent  scrip,  runs  risk  of  the  "  convict 
train"  for  six  months  or  a  year.  One  good  result,  however,  seems  to  have 
followed  this  unrelenting  severity ;  you  may  leave  your  baggage  unprotected 
anywhere  on  the  Texan  lines  of  travel,  and  no  one  will  disturb  it. 

A  branch  line  of  rail  leads  from  the  main  trunk  of  the  "  International  and 
Great  Northern"  to  the  Penitentiary,  prettily  situated  among  green  fields  and 
pleasant  hills.  It  is  vigilantly  guarded  everywhere  by  armed  men.  Inside,  the 
shops  are  light  and  cheery,  and  the  men  and  women,  even  the  "  lifers,"  who 
have  stained  their  hands  with  blood,  look  as  contented  in  the  cotton  spinning 
room  as  the  ordinary  factory  hand  does  after  a  few  years  of  eleven  hours'  toil 
daily.  The  prisoners  make  shoes,  clothing,  furniture  and  wagons,  weave  good 
cottons  and  woolens,  and  it  is  even  proposed  to  set  them  at  building  cars. 

The  large  number  of  prisoners  serving  life  sentences  seemed  surprising  until, 
upon  looking  over  the  register,  we  noted  the  frequency  of  the  crime  of  murder. 
The  cases  of  murderous  assault — classified  under  the  head  of  "attempt  to  kill" — 
were  generally  punished  by  a  term  of  two  to  five  years ;  never  more.  At  the 
time  of  my  visit  there  were  seventy  persons  so  sentenced. 

Since  the  passage  of  the  act  making  the  carrying  of  concealed  weapons 
illegal,  these  commitments  are  not  so  common.  Yet  the  Democratic  Legislature 
last  assembled — true  to  its  principle  of  undoing  all  which  had  been  done  by  its 
Republican  predecessors — would  gladly  have  repealed  the  law. 

In  a  corridor  of  the  Penitentiary  I  saw  a  tall,  finely-formed  man,  with 
bronzed  complexion,  and  long,  flowing,  brown  hair- — a  man  princely  in  carriage, 
and  on  whom  even  the  prison  garb  seemed  elegant.  It  was  Satanta,  the  chief  of 
the  Kiowas,  who  with  his  brother  chief,  Big  Tree,  is  held  to  account  for  murder. 
Being  presently  introduced  to  a  venerable  bigamist  who,  on  account  of  his 
smattering  of  Spanish,  was  Satanta's  interpreter,  I  was,  through  this  obliging 
prisoner,  presented  at  court. 

Satanta  had  stepped  into  the  work-room,  where  he  was  popularly  supposed 
to  labor,  although  he  never  performed  a  stroke  of  work,  and  had  seated  himself 
on  a  pile  of  oakum.  His  fellow-prisoner  explained  to  Satanta,  in  Spanish,  that  I 
desired  to  converse  with  him,  whereupon  he  rose,  and  suddenly  stretching  out 
his  hand,  gave  mine  a  ponderous  grasp,  exclaiming  as  he  did  so,  "  How !"  He 
then  replied  through  his  interpreter  to  the  few  trivial  questions  I  asked,  and 


AN      INTERVIEW      WITH      SATANTA COUNTRY     JAILS. 


121 


again  sat  down,  motioning  to  me  to  be  seated,  with  as  much  dignity  and  grace 
as  though  he  were  a  monarch  receiving  a  foreign  ambassador.  His  face  was 
good ;  but  there  was  a  delicate  curve  of  pain  at  the  lips  which  contrasted  oddly 
with  the  strong  Indian  cast  of  the  other  features.  Although  much  more  than 
sixty  years  old,  he  hardly  seemed  forty,  so  erect  was  he,  so  elastic  and  vigorous. 

When  asked  if  he  ever  expected  liberation,  and  what  he  would  do  if  it  should 
come,  he  responded,  with  the  most  stoical  indifference,  "  Quien  sabe f"  "Big 
Tree"  was  meanwhile  briskly  at  work  in  another  apartment  plaiting  a  chair  seat, 
and  vigorously  chewing  tobacco.  His  face  was  clear  cut  and  handsome,  his  coal 
black  hair  swept  his  shoulders,  and  he  paused  only  to  brush  it  back,  give  us  a 
swift  glance,  and  then  turn  briskly  to  his  plaiting  as  before.  The  course  pursued 
toward  these  Indians  seems  the  proper  one ;  it  is  only  by  imposing  upon  them 
the  penalties  to  which  other  residents 
of  the  State  are  subject  that  they  can 
be   taught   their  obligations.* 

The  Penitentiary  in  Texas  is  sat- 
isfactorily conducted,  being  leased  from 
the  State  by  enterprising  persons  who 
make  it  a  real  industrial  school,  albeit  a 
severe  one.  But  certain  of  the  jails  in 
the  State  are  a  disgrace  to  civilization, 
and  many  intelligent  people  at  Austin 
spoke  with  horror  of  the  manner  in 
which  criminals  were  treated  in  the 
"black-hole"  in  that  place.  All  the 
barbarities  of  the  Middle  Ages  seemed 
in  force  in  it. 

There  is  also  a  certain  contempt  for 
the  ordinary  board  or  brick  county  jail, 
manifested    by   a    class   of  desperadoes 

and  OUtlaWS,  Unhappily  not  yet  extinct  in  "Satanta  had  seated   himself  on  a  pile  of  oakum." 

the  remote  sections  of  the  State.  During  my  last  visit  to  Austin,  the  inhabitants 
were  excited  over  a  daring  jail  delivery  effected  in  an  adjacent  county  by  a  band 
of  outlaws.  Some  of  their  fellows  had  been  secured,  and  the  outlaws  rode 
to  the  jail,  in  broad  daylight,  attacked  it,  and  rescued  the  criminals,  killing  one 
or  two  of  the  defenders,  and  firing,  as  a  narrator  told  me,  with  a  touch  of 
enthusiasm  in  his  voice,  "about  eighty  shots  in  less  'n  three  minutes."  Not 
long  after,  tidings  were  brought  us  of  the  descent  of  an  armed  body  of  men 
upon  the  jail  in  Brenham,  a  large  and  prosperous  town,  and  the  rescue  of  crim- 
inals there. 

As  a  rule,  however,  such  acts  of  lawless  violence  are  due  more  to  the  careless- 
ness of  the  law  officers  in  securing  their  prisoners  than  to  any  defiance  of  law. 
It  would  be  singular  if,  in  a  State  once  so  overrun  by  villains  as  Texas,  there  were 


*   Satanta  and  Big  Tree  have  since  been  set  at  liberty. 


122  PICTURES      FROM     THE      PLAINS. 

no  defiant  rascals  still  unhung.  Governor  Davis,  in  his  last  annual  message, 
admitted  that  in  four-fifths  of  the  counties  the  jails  were  not  secure,  and  that  the 
constant  escape  of  prisoners  was  made  the  excuse  for  a  too  free  exercise  of  lynch 
law  upon  persons  accused  of  offences.  He  also  added  that  the  jails  so  constructed 
as  to  secure  the  prisoners  confined  in  them  were  dens  unfit  for  the  habitation 
of  wild  beasts. 

To  the  credit  of  Texas,  however,  it  should  be  said  that  political  bitterness 
rarely,  if  ever,  has  any  part  in  the  scenes  of  violence  enacted  in  certain  counties ; 
the  rude  character  of  the  people,  and  the  slow  return  to  organized  society 
after  the  war,  being  the  real  causes  of  the  troubles  in  those  regions.  Under 
the  reconstruction  government,  law  and  order  had  returned,  and  it  is  to  be  hoped 
that  the  now  dominant  legislators  will  do  nothing  to  hinder  their  supremacy  in 
the  by-ways  as  well  as  the  highways  of  the  State.  The  Democratic  Legislature 
can  ill  afford  to  undo  the  wise  legislation  which  established  a  State  police  for 
the  arrest  and  punishment  of  outlaws,  and  which  forbade  the  carrying  of  con- 
cealed weapons. 

The  little  towns  along  the  International  and  Great  Northern  railroad  are  as 
yet  very  primitive,  and  constructed  upon  the  same  monotonous,  stereotyped  plan 
as  those  on  the  Red  river.  From  Houston  to  Palestine  the  road  runs  through  a 
country  of  great  possibilities.  On  all  these  new  lines  the  picture  is  very  much 
the  same.      Let  us  take  one  as  it  looks  in  the  early  dawn. 

Morning  comes  sharply  on  the  great  plains,  and  sends  a  thrill  of  joy  through 
all  nature.  The  screaming  engine  frightens  from  the  track  a  hundred  wild-eyed, 
long-horned  cattle  that  stand  for  a  moment  in  the  swampy  pools  by  the  road- 
side, jutting  out  their  heads,  flourishing  their  tails  angrily,  and  noisily  bellowing, 
as  if  resenting  the  impertinence  of  the  flame-breathing  iron  monster,  and  then 
bound  away  like  deer. 

On  the  slope  of  a  little  hill  stand  a  dozen  horses,  gazing  naively  at 
the  train;  a  shrill  yell  from  the  steam-throttle  sends  them  careering  half  a 
mile  away,  their  superb  necks  extended,  their  limbs  spurning  the  ground. 
Behind  them  gallop  a  hundred  pigs,  grimy  and  fierce,  snorting  impatiently 
at   being    disturbed. 

In  the  distance  one  can  see  an  adroit  horseman  lassoing  the  stupid  beef 
creature  which  he  has  marked  for  slaughter.  He  drives  it  a  little  apart  from  the 
herd,  and  it  turns  upon  him ;  a  quick  twirl  of  his  wrist,  and  he  has  thrown  the 
deadly  noose  about  its  neck,;  a  rapid  gallop  of  a  few  seconds,  and  he  has  tight- 
ened the  long  rope.  The  horse  seems  to  enjoy  the  sport,  bracing  himself  as  the 
animal  makes  a  few  angry  struggles,  and  then  gallops  rapidly  once  more  away. 
The  poor  beef,  now  in  the  tortures  of  suffocation,  falls  upon  his  knees  and 
staggers  blindly  and  heavily  forward,  bellowing  hoarsely  and  brandishing  his 
horns ;  again  he  falls  headlong ;  and  once  more  piteously  bellows  as  much  as  his 
choked  throat  will  permit.  The  disturbed  herd  walk  slowly  and  mournfully 
away,  huddling  together  as  if  for  protection.  At  last  the  horseman,  loosening  a 
little  the  dreadful  noose,  forces  the  subdued  creature  to  follow  him  submissively, 
and  so  takes  him  to  the  slaughter. 


NEW      TOWNS CAMPING      OUT. 


123 


This  wonderful  expanse  of  plain,  which  melts  away  so  delicately  into  the 
bright  blue  of  the  cloudless  sky,  has  inspiration  in  it.  The  men  and  women 
whom  one  meets  at  the  little  stations  along  the  road  are  alert  and  vigorous; 
the  glow  of  health  is  upon  them ;  the  very  horses  are  full  of  life,  and  gallop 
briskly,  tossing  their  heads  and  distending  their  nostrils. 

Every  half  hour  we  reach  some  small  town  of  board  shanties,  crowned  with 
ambitious  signs.  Each  of  these  hamlets  is  increasing  weekly  by  fifties  and 
hundreds  in  population.  As  the  train  passes,  the  negroes  gather  in  groups  to 
gaze  at  it  until  it  disappears  in  the  distance.  At  one  lonely  little  house  on  the 
edge  of  a  superb  wheat  country  a  group   of  Germans,  newly  come,  is  patiently 


"As  the  train  passes,  the  negroes  gather  in  groups  to  gaze  at  it  until  it  disappears  is  the  distance." 

waiting  transportation  into  the  interior.  The  black-gowned,  bare-headed  women 
are  hushing  the  babies  and  pointing  out  to  each  other  the  beauties  of  the  strange 
new  land. 

Not  far  away  is  the  timber  line  which  marks  the  course  of  a  little  creek, 
whose  romantic  banks  are  fringed  with  loveliest  shrubbery.  A  log  cabin's 
chimney  sends  up  a  blue  smoke-wreath,  and  a  tall,  angular  woman  is  cutting 
down  the  brush  near  the  entrance.  A  little  farther  on,  half-a-dozen  small  tents 
glisten  in  the  morning  sun  ;  the  occupants  have  just  awoke,  and  are  crawling  out 
to  bask  in  the  sunshine  and  cook  their  coffee  over  a  fire  of  twigs.  The  air  is 
filled  with  joyous  sounds  of  birds  and  insects,  with  the  tinkling  of  bells,  with  the 
rustling  of  leaves,  with  the  rippling  of  rivulets.  One  longs  to  leave  the  railroad, 
and  plunge  into  the  inviting  recesses  which  he  imagines  must  lie  within  reach. 


124  JEFFERSON MARSHALL NORTH-EASTERN      TEXAS. 

The  Houston  and  Texas  Central  railroad  route  runs  through  neither  a  bold 
nor  broken  country,  but  is  bordered  for  at  least  a  hundred  miles  by  exquisite 
foliage  and  thickets.  At  Hearne,  120  miles  from  Houston,  it  meets  the  Interna- 
tional line  running  to  Longview,  and  furnishing  the  route  to  Jefferson,  at  the  head 
of  the  chain  of  lakes  extending  to  Shreveport,  in  Louisiana. 

These  lakes  were  formed  by  the  obstructions  created  by  the  Red  river 
raft,  and  Jefferson  has  become,  by  the  diversion  of  the  waters  of  this  river  from 
their  natural  channel,  the  head  of  navigation  in  that  section.  An  important 
steamboat  commerce  with  New  Orleans,  St.  Louis,  and  Cincinnati  has  sprung  up 
here,  and  Jefferson  now  exports  nearly  100,000  bales  of  cotton  annually.  Before 
the  Texas  Pacific  railroad  branch  from  Marsha^  was  completed,  20,000  wagons 
freighted  with  cotton  yearly  entered  the  town.  Though  the  war  found  Jefferson 
a  miserable  collection  of  one-story  shanties,  it  is  now  a  city  of  10,000  inhabit- 
ants, with  elegant  brick  buildings,  and  a  trade  of  $20,000,000  annually.  To 
what  it  may  grow,  now  that  it  is  connected  with  the  direct  route  to  St.  Louis,  and 
that  15,000  square  miles  of  territory  in  Northern  Texas  are  opened  to  settlement, 
no  one  can  tell.  Marshall  not  only  enjoys  much  the  same  advantages  as  Jefferson, 
but  is  the  head-quarters  in  Texas  of  the  great  Texas  and  Pacific  railway  which 
the  famous  Scott  is  stretching  across  the  country  to  El  Paso,  and  which  is  already 
completed  beyond  Dallas.  The  same  genius  now  presides  over  the  destinies  of 
the  Transcontinental  line,  to  run  through  the  upper  counties  from  Texarkana  to 
Fort  Worth,  where  the  two  routes  are  merged  in  the  main  line,  which  shoots  out 
thence  straight  to  the  Mexican  frontier. 

The  International  railroad  as  originally  planned  was  to  extend  via  Austin 
and  San  Antonio  into  Mexico;  but  a  Democratic  Legislature  refused  to  accord 
the  aid  offered  by  its  Republican  predecessor. 

North-eastern  Texas  has  extensive  iron  interests,  and,  throughout  the  counties 
in  the  vicinity  of  Jefferson,  large  foundries  are  grouping  villages  around  them. 
These  beds  of  iron  ore,  lying  so  near  the  head  of  steamboat  navigation,  are 
destined  to  an  immense  development.  All  the  north  of  the  State  is  rich  in 
minerals. 

In  the  wild  Wichita  regions,  where  exploring  parties  have  braved  the  Indians, 
there  is  an  immense  copper  deposit,  continuing  thence  hundreds  of  miles,  even  to 
the  Rio  Grande.  The  copper  ore  from  some  of  the  hills  has  been  tested,  and 
will  yield  fifty-five  per  cent,  of  metal.  Notwithstanding  even  the  expense  of 
transporting  ore  500  miles  by  wagon,  the  copper  mines  of  Archer  County  have 
proved  profitable.  All  the  requisites  for  building  furnaces  and  smelting  the  ores 
exist  in  the  immediate  vicinity  of  the  deposits.  The  whole  copper  region  is 
exquisitely  beautiful.  The  mountains  are  bold  and  romantic ;  the  valleys 
mysterious  and  picturesque;  the  plains  covered  with  flowers — and  Indians! 
But  who  will  let  the  ignoble  savage  stand  in  the  way  of  mineral  development  ? 

The  Indian  troubles  in  North-western  Texas  are  quite  as  grave  as  those  in  the 
extreme  western  part  of  the  State.  Now  and  then  an  adventurous  frontiersman 
is  swept  down  by  the  remorseless  savage,  who  seems  to  delight  in  waiting  until 
his  victim  fancies  he  has  attained  security  before  murdering  him  and  his  family. 


WACO DALLAS THE      LABOR     QUESTION.  125 

Government  should  certainly  afford  better  protection  to  the  settler  on  the 
extreme  frontier — by  some  other  method  if  it  cannot  do  it  by  means  of  the 
regular  army. 

Waco,  now  a  fine  town,  on  a  branch  of  the  Texas  Central,  -was  once  an 
Indian  village,  and,  long  ago,  was  the  scene  of  a  formidable  battle  between  the 
Wacos  and  some  Cherokee  forces.  The  noble  Wacos  had  acquired,  in  a  surrepti- 
tious manner,  a  good  many  Cherokee  ponies,  and,  in  the  pursuit  and  battle 
which  followed,  the  Waco  village  was  plundered  and  burned,  and  extensive  forti- 
fications— traces  of  which  still  remain — were  heaped  with  the  conquered  thieves' 
dead  bodies.  Waco,  situated  on  the  Brazos  river,  is  to-day  a  handsome,  solidly- 
built  town,  possessing  many  manufacturing  establishments.  Throughout  all  the 
adjacent  region  stock-raising  is  fast  giving  way  to  agriculture ;  and  great  fields 
of  cotton,  corn  and  cane  are  springing  into  existence.  Every  one  has  heard  of 
Dallas,  set  down  on  the  banks  of  the  Trinity  river,  and  contributed  to  by  the 
great  feeders  of  the  Texas  Central  and  Texas  Pacific.  It  grows  like  an 
enchanted  castle  in  a  fairy  tale.  Dallas  is  the  centre  of  Northern  Texas ;  has 
superb  water  power,  and  lumber,  coffee,  iron,  lead,  and  salt  fields  to  draw  upon. 
In  the  midst  of  the  rich,  undulating  prairies,  and  near  a  plateau  covered  with 
noble  oaks,  elms  and  cedars,  it  promises  to  be  beautiful  as  well  as  prosperous.  It 
is  also  one  of  the  centres  of  the  wheat  region,  some  of  the  finest  wheat  lands  on 
the  continent  being  in  its  vicinity.  The  absolutely  best  wheat  region  is  said  to 
be  in  Lamar,  Hunt,  Kaufman,  and  Navarro  counties. 

The  eastern  corners  of  the  lands  now  settled  in  Northern  Texas  were  nearly 
all  held  by  emigrants  from  Alabama,  Georgia,  and  Mississippi  until  the  railroad's 
advent,  when  the  North-westerner  joined  them  in  the  country,  and  the  Northerner 
mingled  with  them  in  the  towns.  Slavery  flourished  there  before  the  war,  and 
the  revolution  improved  neither  the  negro  nor  his  old  master  much;  so  that  both 
are  gradually  yielding  before  the  new-comers. 

In  the  northern  and  middle  counties,  however,  slavery  never  was  popular. 
Some  3,000  families  from  Indiana  and  Illinois  were  introduced  into  those 
counties  between  1843  and  1854.  They  owned  no  slaves  and  never  desired 
any;  and  the  influence  of  their  example  was  good  even  before  emancipation 
came.  Hundreds  of  intelligent  and  cultured  families  live  there,  happy  and 
well-to-do,  sowing  their  wheat  and  rye  in  October,  and  reaping  it  in  June ; 
planting  corn  in  February,  to  harvest  in  September ;  and  raising  great  herds  of 
cattle  and  horses. 

The  black,  sandy  lands  are  admirably  suited  for  orchards  and  vineyards ;  and 
the  "  black- waxy," — a  rich  alluvial, — for  all  the  cereals.  As  all  the  cotton  lands 
of  Northern  Texas  will  readily  produce  a  bale  to  the  acre,  how  many  years  will 
pass  before  the  cotton  crop  of  the  Lone  Star  State  will  be  10,000,000  bales? 

The  labor  question  is  to  be  an  engrossing  one  in  Texas  very  soon.  The 
proportion  of  the  colored  to  the  entire  population  being  small,  the  negroes'  share 
in  the  labor  of  cultivation  is,  of  course,  not  large.  The  Chinaman  is  already  at 
St.  Louis ;  the  completion  of  the  Texas  Pacific  railroad  will  establish  him 
along    the  whole  Texan  coast.      At  present,  in  great  numbers  of  the  counties, 


126  MINERALS  —  AGRICULTURAL     RESOURCES. 

there  is  hardly  one  negro  to  fifty  white  people,  so  that  Cufifee  stands  no  whit  in 
the  way  of  John. 

With  one  single  field  of  coal  covering  6,000  square  miles ;  with  apparently 
inexhaustible  copper  and  iron  stores;  with  lead  and  silver  mines;  with  20,000,000 
of  acres  of  cotton-bearing  land,  and  with  agricultural  resources  equal  to  those  of 
any  State  in  the  Union,  Texas  can  enter  upon  her  new  career  confidently  and 
joyously.  As  a  refuge  for  the  ruined  of  our  last  great  revolution,  she  is  benefi- 
cent ;  as  an  element  of  greatness  in  the  progress  of  the  United  States,  she  has  no 
superior.  She  has  peculiar  advantages  over  her  sister  Southern  States.  While 
they  vainly  court  emigration,  the  tide  flows  freely  across  her  borders,  and 
spreads  out  over  her  vast  plains.  Whatever  danger  there  may  be  of  political 
disagreements  and  disturbances  within  her  limits,  nothing  can  permanently 
impede  her  progress.  Lying  below  the  snow  line,  she  furnishes  the  best  route 
to  the  Pacific;  fronting  on  the  Gulf,  she  will  some  day  have  a  commercial  navy, 
whose  sails  will  whiten  every  European  sea. 

Few  persons  who  have  not  visited  the  South  appreciate  the  vast  extent  of 
territory  which  the  Texas  and  Pacific  route  has  opened  up.  Its  most  beneficent 
work  will  be  the  chasing  of  the  Indian  from  the  vicinity  of  the  "  cross-timber  " 
country,  which  is  an  excellent  location  for  small  farmers.  The  settlers  there  are 
bravely  holding  on  to  their  lands,  keeping  up  a  continual  warfare  with  the  red- 
skins, in  hopes  that  they  may  preserve  their  lives  until  the  advent  of  the  rail. 

The  Indian  reserves  in  this  section  of  the  State  have,  according  to  the 
testimony  of  competent  authorities,  all  been  failures,  whether  considered  as 
protection  to  the  white  man  or  as  a  means  of  civilization  to  the  Indian.  For  ten 
years  the  savage  has  been  master  of  all  that  part  of  Texas.  The  new  Pacific 
route  will  not  only  send  a  civilizing  current  through  there,  but  will  also  develop 
a  portion  of  the  great  "  Staked  Plain  "  territory,  now  one  of  the  unknown  and 
mysterious  regions  of  Northern  Texas.  The  Transcontinental  branch  is  doing 
good  pioneer  work  in  new  counties.  It  also  runs  through  some  of  the  oldest 
and  most  cultured  sections  of  the  State. 

Clarksville,  in  Red  River  county,  has  long  been  a  centre  of  intelligence  and 
refinement;  it  was  settled  early  in  18 17,  and  in  i860  had  under  cultivation  nearly 
17,000  acres  of  corn  and  8,000  acres  of  cotton.  It  is  noteworthy  that  in  this 
county  lands  which  have  been  steadily  cultivated  for  fifty  years  show  no  depreci- 
ation in  quality.  Paris,  a  handsome  town  in  Lamar  county,  is  also  touched  by 
this  line.  These  towns  and  counties  offer  a  striking  contrast  to  other  portions  of 
the  northern  section  which  lie  within  a  day's  journey  of  them.  They  are  like 
oases,  but  the  rest  of  the  apparent  desert  is  being  so  rapidly  reclaimed,  that  they 
will  soon  be  noticeable  no  longer.  By  all  means  let  him  who  wishes  to  cultivate 
fruit,  cotton,  or  the  cereals  in  Texas  visit  these  elder  counties. 


XII. 


AUSTIN,     THE     TEXAN     CAPITAL — POLITICS — SCHOOLS. 


MY  various  journeys  to  Austin,  the  capital  of  Texas,  enabled  me  to  judge 
of  its  winter  and  summer  aspects,  and  I  do  not  hesitate  to  pronounce 
them  both  delightful.  The  town  itself  is  not  so  interesting  at  first  sight  as  either 
Galveston  or  Houston ;  but  every  day  adds  to  the  charm  which  it  throws  about 
the  visitor.  At  Austin  the  peculiarities  of  Western  and  Eastern  Texas  meet  and 
compromise ;  one  sees  the  wild  hunter  of  the  plains  and  the  shrewd  business 
man  of  the  coast 
side  by  side  in 
friendly  inter- 
course. The  ma- 
jority of  the 
public  buildings 
are  not  architect- 
urally fine ;  the 
Capitol,  the  Land 
Office,  the  Gov- 
ernor's Mansion, 
are  large  and  com- 
modious, but  not 
specially  interest- 
ing. But  a  touch 
of  the  grand  old 
Spanish  architect- 
ure has   Crept  intO  The  State  Capitol— Austin. 

the  construction  of  the  Insane  Asylum,  which  is  built  of  the  soft  gray  sand- 
stone so  abundant  in  that  region ;  and  the  edifice,  standing  in  a  great  park, 
whose  superb  trees  seem  to  have  been  cultured  for  centuries,  rather  than  to  be 
mere  gifts  of  nature,  is  very  beautiful. 

It  is,  however,  overcrowded  with  unfortunates,  and  the  State's  imperative 
duty  is  to  build  another  asylum  at  once.  Under  the  rich  glow  of  the  February 
sun  the  white  walls  of  the  structure  formed  a  delicious  contrast  to  the  foliage  of 
the  live  oaks  near  at  hand,  making  it  seem  more  like  a  temple  than  like  the 
retreat  of  clouded  reason.  In  wandering  through  the  wards  I  came  suddenly 
upon  a  group  of  idiot  girls,  seated  on  benches  in  a  niche  before  a  sunny  window. 
These  poor  creatures  cowered  silently — grimacing  now  and  then — as  I  stood 
gazing  upon  them,  when  suddenly  one  or  two  of  them,  doubtless  excited  by  the 

9 


128 


TEXAS     STATE     INSTITUTIONS. 


presence  of  a  visitor,  rose  and  began  dancing  and  shrieking.  The  suddenness  of 
the  transition,  and  the  fearful,  mysterious  nature  of  these  idiotic  saturnalia, 
appalled  me.  I  avow  that  I  could  hardly  drag  my  limbs  to  the  door,  and  when 
once    more    in  the    sunlight   I  felt  as  if  I  had  come  from  Dante's  Hell.     The 

cheery  German  physician  in  charge 
complained  of  the  overcrowded  con- 
dition of  the  asylum,  adding  that  as 
the  majority  of  the  cases  brought  him 
had  already  become  chronic,  it  was  a 
hopeless  throng  with  which  he  had 
to  deal. 

In  a  yard  of  the  asylum,  comfort- 
ably inclosed,  and  covered  by  a  pic- 
turesque roof  upon  which  a  vine  had 
been  trained,  I  saw  the  sty  in  which 
"Queen  Elizabeth,"  a  filthy  and  dread- 
ful old  negress,  wallowed  all  day  long. 
Behind  green  lattices  neatly  set  into 
the  walls  of  another  building,  I  could 
hear  the  furiously  insane  groaning  and 

The  State  Insane  Asylum— Austin  shouting.  It     is     Said     that     there    are 

more  than   1,200  insane  in  the  State,  for  most  of  whom  an  asylum  is  necessary. 

Not  far  from  the  Lunatic  Asylum,  in  another  beautiful  nook,  is  the  institution 
for  the  blind,  which  comprises  a  school  for  the  industrial  training  of  the  patients 
whose  vision  is  hopelessly  lost.  The  Colorado  river  flows  to  the  westward  of 
Austin,  close  to  the  city,  issuing  from 
a  romantic  mountain  range,  a  long 
gap  in  which  forms  what  is  known 
as  the  Colorado  Valley;  and  on 
the  west  bank  of  the  river  is  an  effi- 
cient and  pleasant  school  and  home 
for  the  deaf  and  dumb  of  the  State. 

One  of  the  notable  sights  of 
Austin,  too,  is  the  well-drilled  little 
company  of  cadets  from  the  "Texas 
Military  Institute,"  originally  located 
at  Bastrop,  but  now  situated  on  a 
lovely  hill -side  near  the  capital. 
The  school,  which  is  one  of  general 
and  applied  science,  is  modeled  after 


The  Texas  Military  Institute  —  Austin. 


West  Point  and  the  Virginia  Military  Institute,  and  can  receive  one  hundred 
cadets,  whose  gray  uniformed  company  is  often  seen  in  martial  array  in  the 
lanes    and    fields    near   the    town. 

Austin  is  very  prettily  set  down  in  an  amphitheatre   of  hills,  beyond  which 
rises  the  blue   Colorado   range.     The  little  town,   which  boasts  "  from  8,000  to 


THE     LEGISLATURE RECONSTRUCTION. 


129 


10,000  inhabitants,"  is  very  lively  during  the  legislative  session.  One  passenger 
train  daily,  each  way,  connects  it  with  the  outer  world ;  beyond  are  the 
mesquite-covered  plains,  and  only  wagon  roads. 

The  governor,  whose  term  of  office  lasts  four  years,  has  a  special  mansion, 
which  was  the  president's  house  when  Austin  was  the  capital  of  the  Texan 
republic ;  and  the  surroundings  of  his  office  at  the  Capitol  are  of  Spartan  plain- 
ness. In  both  the  Senate  and  the  House  of  Representatives  I  noticed  a  good 
deal  of  the  freedom  of  Western  and  South-western  manners,  which  would  be 
counted  strange  in  the  older  States.  There  were  no  objections,  apparently,  to 
the  enjoyment  of  his  cigar  by  any  honorable  senator  on  the  floor  of  the  Senate, 
if  the  session  was  not  actually  in  progress ;  senators  sat  with  their  feet  upon  their 
desks,  and  the  friendly  spittoon  handy ;  but  these  are  eccentricities  which  prevail 
in  many  a  State  beside  Texas.  There 
were  men  of  culture  and  refinement  in 
the  Senate,  others  who  were  coarse  in 
manners  and  dress ;  the  president  was 
amiable  and  efficient.  One  or  two 
negroes  occupied  senatorial  chairs, 
although  the  Thirteenth  Legislature, 
which  I  saw,  was  almost  entirely  Dem- 
ocratic. The  House  of  Representatives 
was  a  sensible,  shrewd  -  looking  body 
of  men,  with  no  special  Southern  type ; 
a  Northerner  might  readily  have  im- 
agined himself  in  a  New  England 
legislature  during  the  session,  save  for 
certain  peculiarities  of  dialect  Here, 
also,  there  were  negroes,  more  numer- 
ous than  in  the  Senate,  and  mingling  somewhat  more  freely  in  the  business 
of  the  session.  The  portraits  of  Austin  and  Houston  looked  down  benignantly 
upon  the  lawgivers. 

Texas  went  through  a  variety  of  vexatious  trials  during  the  period  between 
the  close  of  the  war  and  the  election  of  what  is  known  as  the  "Davis  party." 
A.  J.  Hamilton  was  appointed  provisional  governor  by  President  Johnson,  but 
surrendered  his  power  in  1 866  into  the  hands  of  Governor  Throckmorton,  the 
successful  "  Conservative  Union"  candidate,  who  was  elected  after  the  adoption 
of  a  new  State  constitution  by  a  majority  of  more  than  36,000  votes  over  E.  M. 
Pease,  the  "Radical"  candidate.  The  advent  of  reconstruction  brought  Texas 
into  the  Fifth  Military  District  with  Louisiana,  and  under  the  control  of  General 
Sheridan.  In  1867  Governor  Throckmorton,  who  was  considered  an  "obstacle" 
to  reconstruction,  was  removed,  and  the  defeated  candidate  Pease  made  governor 
in  his  stead.  During  his  administration,  he  had  a  controversy  with  General 
Hancock,  who  had  meantime  been  appointed  commander  of  the  district  in  place 
of  Sheridan,  and  was  prevented  from  undertaking  several  arbitrary  measures 
which  the  military*  authorities  deemed  inexpedient  at  that  time. 


The  Governor's  Mansion  — Austin. 


I30  THE     DAVIS     PARTY DEMOCRATS     NOW     IN     POWER. 

The  new  registration  which  came  into  force  in  Texas,  as  elsewhere  in  the 
South,  reduced  the  number  of  white  voters  from  80,000  to  a  little  less  than 
57,000.  A  second  Constitutional  Convention  was  held  in  June  of  1868,  in 
obedience  to  an  order  from  the  army  authorities,  then  represented  by  General 
Rousseau,  who  succeeded  General  Hancock  in  command.  This  convention  was 
presided  over  by  Edmund  J.  Davis,  an  uncompromising  loyal  man,  who  had  once 
had  a  Confederate  rope  around  his  neck  in  war-time.  The  State  was  at  that 
time  in  a  very  bad  condition.  Murder  and  lawlessness  were  rampant ;  it  was 
said  that  there  had  been  nine  hundred  homicides  in  the  State  between  1865  and 
1868.  The  Conservative  and  Radical  wings  of  the  Republican  party  had  much 
sharp  discussion  in  the  convention,  which  was  finally  adjourned  until  the  last 
days  of  November.  Meantime,  the  differences  of  opinion  between  the  wings 
of  the  party  brought  forward  Mr.  Davis  as  the  Radical,  and  A.  J.  Hamilton  as 
the  Conservative  candidate  for  governor.  The  constitution  was  submitted  to  the 
people  in  November,  and  ratified  by  more  than  67,000  majority.  Mr.  Davis  and 
his  party  were  at  the  same  time  elected  to  power,  and  the  military  force  was 
withdrawn. 

Governor  Davis  certainly  succeeded  in  restoring  order  and  maintaining  peace 
in  the  State  during  the  four  years  of  his  administration,  although  some  of  his 
measures  were  bitterly  opposed.  He  inaugurated  the  militia  act,  which  the 
Democrats  of  course  fought  against.  It  was  an  act  delegating  to  the  governor 
the  power  to  suspend  the  laws  in  disturbed  districts,  and  was  perfectly  efficient  in 
the  only  three  cases  in  which  it  was  ever  resorted  to.  During  his  term,  also,  the 
"  State  Police" — a  corps  for  the  maintenance  of  order  throughout  the  State — 
was  established,  and  did  much  to  rid  Texas  of  outlaws  and  murderers. 

A  tax-payers'  convention,  held  at  Austin  in  September,  1871,  united  all  the 
elements  of  opposition  against  the  Davis  party.  Ex- Governors  Throckmorton, 
Pease  and  Hamilton  participated  in  it.  The  Democrats  re-organized,  and  suc- 
ceeded in  securing  the  Legislature,  which  is  elected  annually  in  Texas.  Toward 
the  close  of  Governor  Davis's  term,  as  the  tenure  of  office  of  some  of  the  State 
officials  was  involved  in  doubt,  the  Legislature  passed  an  act  providing  for  a 
general  election  in  December.  A  new  and  vehement  political  contest  at  once 
sprang  up.  The  Republicans  renominated  Governor  Davis,  and  the  Democrats, 
who  had  been  powerfully  reinforced  by  thousands  of  immigrants  from  Alabama, 
Georgia,  and  other  cotton  States,  put  forward  Judge  Richard  Coke  as  their  can- 
didate. In  the  election  which  followed,  the  Democrats  elected  Judge  Coke  as 
governor  by  more  than  40,000  majority ;  and  the  State  was  completely  given 
over  to  the  Conservative  element. 

This  election  caused  great  excitement  among  the  Republicans.  Governor 
Davis,  backed  up  by  the  declaration  of  the  Supreme  Court  of  the  State  that 
the  recent  election  was  unconstitutional,  at  first  refused  to  yield  his  power, 
and  called  on  the  President  for  troops  to  maintain  him  in  office.  But  the  United 
States  declined  to  interfere ;  the  Democrats  took  possession  of  the  Capitol ;  and 
Governor  Davis  finally  withdrew  his  opposition.  The  Democrats  propose  in  due 
time  to  hold  another  Constitutional  Convention,  and  threaten  to  undo  much  of 


THE      ALAMO      MONUMENT AUSTIN      IN      BY-GONE      DAYS. 


131 


the  legislation  which,  under  reconstruction  and  the  regime  of  the  Radicals,  had 
proved  salutary  to  the  State. 

On  the  steps  of  the  Capitol  stands  the  small  and  unambitious  monument 
built  of  stone  brought  from  the  Alamo.  It  is  but  a  feeble  memorial  of  one  of  the 
most  tragic  events  in  American  history,  to  which 
the  State  would  do  well  to  give  lasting  commem- 
oration by  some  stately  work  in  bronze  or 
marble    on  Alamo  plaza,   in   San  Antonio. 

In  the  office  of  the  Secretary  of  State  at 
Austin,  one  may  still  see  the  treaties  made 
with  France,  England,  and  other  nations,  when 
Texas  was  a  republic,  when  Louis  Phillippe  was 
King  of  the  French,  and  Victoria  was  young. 
Three  years  after  Texas  had  declared  her  inde- 
pendence of  Mexico,  the  commissioners  ap- 
pointed under  President  Lamar's  Administration 
selected  the  present  site  on  the  Colorado  as  the 
capital,  and,  in  grateful  remembrance  of  the 
"father  of  Texas,"  called  it  Austin.  It  seems, 
indeed,  strange  that  it  has  not  grown  to  the 
proportions  the  commissioners  then  predicted  for 
it;  for  the  best  of  building  stone  and  lime  and 
stone-coal  abound  in  the   vicinity,  and  it  has  an  The  Alamo  Monument— Austin. 

immense  and  fertile  back-country  to  draw  upon.  These  same  commissioners 
also  fondly  hoped,  by  building  the  town,  effectually  to  close  the  pass  by 
which  Indians  and  outlaws  from  Mexico  had  from  time  immemorial  traveled  to 
and  from  the  Rio  Grande  and  Eastern  Texas.  In  October,  1839,  President 
Lamar's  Cabinet  occupied  Austin, — and,  although  Indian  raids  in  the  neigh- 
borhood were  frequent,  the  brave  little  government  remained  there.  Those 
were  great  days  for  Texas, — a  State  with  hardly  the  population  of  one  of  her 
counties  to-day,  yet  holding  independent  relations  with  the  civilized  world. 

The  European  governments  had  their  representatives  at  the  Court  of  Austin, 
while  hosts  of  adventurers  thronged  the  Congressional  halls.  Gayly- uniformed 
officers  of  the  Texan  army  and  navy  abounded ;  and  the  United  States  daily  felt 
the  pulse  of  the  people  as  to  annexation.  Once  in  a  while  there  was  a  dip- 
lomatic muddle  and  consequent  great  excitement,  as  when, — the  owner  of  some 
pigs  which  had  been  killed  for  encroaching  on  the  French  Minister's  premises 
having  abused  said  minister  in  rather  heated  language, — Louis  Phillippe  felt 
himself  insulted,  and  very  nearly  ruined  the  infant  republic  by  preventing  it  from 
obtaining  what  was  then  known  as  the  "  French  Loan." 

The  Texan  government  in  those  early  days  had  always  been  a  great  strag- 
gler, moving  from  town  to  town,  and  when,  in  1842,  the  Administration 
proposed  to  remove  the  archives  to  Houston,  because  a  Mexican  invasion  was 
feared,  the  citizens  of  Austin  revolted,  and  General  Houston,  the  then  President, 
was  compelled  to  leave  the  records  where  they  were. 


132  POPULATION NEGROES MEXICANS. 

In  the  Secretary  of  State's  office  I  was  shown  the  original  ordinance  for  the 
secession  of  Texas  from  the  Union, — a  formidable  parchment,  graced  with  a 
long  list  of  names, — and  a  collection  of  the  newspapers  printed  in  the  State 
during  the  war,  a  perusal  of  which  showed  that  there  are  several  sides  to  the 
history  of  all  our  battles,  and  that  in  those  days  the  Texans  were  taught  that  the 
Confederates  invariably  won. 

The  four  presidents  of  the  Texan  republic,  Burnet,  Houston,  Lamar  and 
Jones,  were  all  strong  men,  but  of  widely  different  character.  Lamar  was  a 
brilliant  writer  and  talker,  clear-headed  and  accomplished;  Jones  was  an  intel- 
lectual man,  bitter  against  the  Houston  party,  and  to  judge  from  his  own 
memoirs,  jealous  and  irritable.     He  died  by  his  own  hand. 

The  population  of  Texas  has  increased,  since  its  annexation  to  the  Union  in 
1845,  from  150,000  to  more  than  a  million  of  inhabitants.  Its  principal  growth 
has,  of  course,  been  since  the  war,  for  before  that  time  Northern  Texas  was  as 
much  a  wilderness  as  is  Presidio  county  to-day.  The  greatest  needs  of  the  State 
at  the  present  time  are  more  people,  and  more  improvement  along  the  lines  of 
travel.  The  coarse  cookery,  bad  beds,  and  villainous  liquor- drinking  which  one 
now  finds  in  remote  towns  will  vanish  when  people  and  manufactures  and 
inducements  to  ease  and  elegance  come  in. 

A  favorable  sign  on  the  railroads  is  the  occasional  entrance  of  some  rough 
fellow  into  the  Pullman  car,  and  his  intense  enjoyment  of  it.  I  recall  now, 
vividly,  the  gaunt  drover  who  went  to  bed  before  dark  in  one  of  the  berths  of  a 
palace  car  one  evening  between  Austin  and  Hempstead.  "  Never  was  in  one 
of  these  tricks  befo',''  he  said ;  "  I  reckon  I'll  get  my  money's  worth.  But  look 
yere,"  he  added,  to  a  gentleman  near  him,  confidentially,  "if  this  train  should 
bust  up  now,  where'd  the  balance  of  ye  go  to,  d'ye  reckon  ?"  He  appeared  to 
think  the  berth  a  special  protective  arrangement,  and  that  he  was  perfectly  safe 
therein. 

The  negro  and  the  Mexican  are  both  familiar  figures  in  Austin,  and  the 
negro  seems  to  do  well  in  his  free  state,  although  indulging  in  all  kinds  of  queer 
freaks  with  his  money ;  he  saves  nothing.  Sometimes  he  undertakes  long 
journeys  without  the  slightest  idea  where  he  is  going,  and  finding  he  has  not 
money  enough  to  return,  locates  anew.  As  a  rule,  he  does  not  acquire  much 
property,  expending  his  money  on  food  and  raiment — much  of  the  former,  and 
little  of  the  latter.  The  commercial  travelers  in  Texas  all  carry  large  stocks  of 
confectionery,  with  which,  when  they  fail  to  tempt  Sambo  to  expend  his  little 
hoard  in  any  other  manner,  they  generally  manage  to  exhaust  his  means.  There 
is  no  idea  of  economy  in  the  Texan  negro's  head.  On  the  Texas  railroads,  the 
candy  venders  are  allowed  to  roam  at  large  through  the  trains  and  practice  the 
old  swindle  of  prize  packages,  by  which  they  invariably  deplete  the  darkey's 
purse.  They  display  the  tempting  wares,  and  hint  at  the  possibility  of  gold 
dollars  and  greenbacks  in  the  packages;  of  course,  appetite  triumphs,  and 
Sambo  falls. 

The  Land  Office  is  one  of  the  important  institutions  of  Texas,  and  a  main 
feature  of  Austin.     The  United  States  has  no  government  lands  in  the  common- 


THE     TEXAS      LAND     OFFICE THE      STATE     DEBT. 


133 


wealth;  and  the  land  system,  although  somewhat  complicated,  on  account  of 
the  various  colonization  laws  and  old  titles  acquired  under  them,  is  a  good  one. 
In  the  Land  Office  there  is  an  experienced  corps  of  men,  who  have  the  history 
of  each  county  and  its  records  at  their  fingers'  ends,  and  who  can  trace  any  old 
title  back  to  its  Spanish  source.  Plans  of  all  the  counties,  and  every  homestead 
on  them,  are  also  to  be  seen.  This,  in  a  State  where  the  counties  comprise  areas 
of  from  900  to  1800  square  miles  each,  is  of  the  utmost  importance  to  persons 
buying  land  and  wishing  to  establish  a  clear  title  to  it;  although,  as  a  general 
rule,  the  settler  who  acquires  land  under  the  preemption  laws  of  the  State,  has 
no  trouble,  and  runs  no  risk. 

An  attempt  was  once  made  to  sectionize  all  the  State  public  lands,  —  now 
amounting  to  nearly  90,000,000  of  acres, — and  to  offer  them,  as  the  United  States 
does,  in  open  market,  but  it  was  thought  wiser  to  continue  the  original  plan. 
The  legislation  of  Texas  favors  preemption,  and  the  new  settler  had  best  go  with 
it ;  but  he  may  also  become  the  legal  owner  of  a  portion  of  the  public  domain 

by  "locating  a  land  certificate,"  at  from  __ ^^^^ 

thirty- five  to  sixty -five  cents  in  gold 
per  acre,  and  then  proving  his  title  to 
it  by  forming  a  perfect  chain  of  deeds 
from  the  original  grantee  down  to  him- 
self. In  doing  this  the  facilities  afforded 
by  the  Land  Office  are,  of  course,  in- 
valuable. The  State  Bureau  of  immi- 
gration, located  at  Galveston,  has  com- 
missioners constantly  in  the  Southern 
and  Western  States,  and  in  Europe, 
soliciting  immigrants  to  take  up  the 
millions  of  acres  in  the  Western  and 
Northern  parts  of  the  State.  Judging 
from  the  statistics  of  1872-3,  I  should 
say  that  fully  three  thousand  persons 
monthly  land  at  Galveston,  coming  from  the  older  Southern  States.  How  little 
we  at  the  North  have  known,  in  these  last  few  years,  of  this  great,  silent 
exodus,  this  rooting  up  from  home  and  kindred,  which  the  South  has  seen,  and 
the  anguish  of  which  so  many  brave  hearts  have  felt !  But  your  true 
American  is  peripatetic  and  migratory,  so  that  perhaps  the  struggle  is  less 
intense  with  him  than  with  the  Europeans  who  crowd  our  shores. 

Texas  owes  but  little  money — a  trifle  more  than  $1,500,000 — and  her  tax- 
able property,  which  was  estimated  in  1 871  at  $220,000,000,  and  was  then 
thought  to  be  undervalued,  must  now  be  nearly  $300,000,000.  In  most  respects 
the  outlook  of  the  State  is  exceedingly  good ;  certainly  as  favorable  for  immigra- 
tion as  the  majority  of  the  States  of  the  West.  The  grand  middle  ground,  more 
than  1,000  miles  in  extent,  between  the  Atlantic  and  the  Pacific,  it  must  be 
covered  with  railroads  in  every  direction ;  and  even  the  barbarity  of  the  savages 
can  last  but  little  longer. 


The  Land  Office  of  Texas  —  Austin. 


134  JOURNALISM     AND     SCHOOLS     IN     TEXAS, 

Journalism  has  had  an  astonishing  growth  in  Texas  since  the  war.  Out  of 
140  newspapers  now  printed  in  the  State,  no  have  been  started  since  the  close 
of  the  great  struggle.  Most  of  the  small  new  towns  have  two  or  three  papers 
each,  and  support  them  handsomely.  The  proprietor  of  a  weekly  journal,  in  one 
of  the  mushroom  cities,  told  me  that  five  columns  of  his  paper  paid  him  $6,000 
clear  profit  yearly. 

Everybody — merchant,  gambler,  railroad  contractor,  clergyman,  desperado — 
patronizes  the  newspaper,  and  pays  large  prices  for  advertising.  The  majority  of 
the  papers  are  Democratic,  but  in  the  cities  the  Republicans  usually  have  influen- 
tial organs.  "  Democratic"  does  not  always  mean  a  full  support  of  the  party,  but 
a  kind  of  independent  journalism,  to  which  the  air  of  Texas  is  more  conducive 
than  even  that  of  the  North.  The  Age  and  Union  in  Houston,  the  Civilian,  Post, 
and  Standard  in  Galveston,  the  Times  in  Jefferson,  the  Reporter  in  Tyler,  and  the 
State  Journal,  Gazette,  and  Statesman  in  Austin,  and  the  Red  River  Journal  in 
Denison,  are  among  the  principal  newspapers  published  either  daily  or  tri- 
weekly. Almost  every  county  has  an  excellent  weekly,  filled  with  enthusiastic 
editorials  on  the  development  of  the  State,  and  appeals  to  the  people  to  appre- 
ciate their  advantages.  The  Germans  have  also  established  several  influential 
journals  both  in  Western  and  Eastern  Texas;  and  all  of  them  are  very  prosperous. 
In  Galveston,  Houston,  and  all  the  principal  towns  there  are  elegantly- appointed 
German  book-stores,  whose  counters  are  freighted  weekly  with  the  intellectual 
novelties  of  the  Old  Country. 

The  school  question,  so  seriously  and  severely  disputed  in  all  the  Southern 
States,  has  created  much  discussion  in  Texas ;  and,  indeed,  the  people  do  well  to 
occupy  themselves  with  the  subject;  for  it  is  estimated  that  in  1873  there  were 
yet  in  the  State  70,895  white,  and  150,617  colored  persons  over  ten  years  of  age 
who  could  neither  read  nor  write.  This  appalling  per  centage  of  ignorance  is 
gradually  decreasing  under  the  beneficent  workings  of  the  new  system,  which 
came  in  with  reconstruction,  and  to  which  there  was,  of  course,  a  vast  deal  of 
opposition. 

Texas  has  always  been  reasonably  liberal  in  matters  of  education ;  as  early  as 
1829  the  laws  of  Coahuila  and  Texas  made  provisions  for  schools  on  the  Lancas- 
trian plan ;  the  republic  inaugurated  the  idea  of  a  bureau  of  education,  and  its 
Congress  took  measures  for  establishing  a  State  university.  After  annexation, 
free  public  schools  were  established,  and  supported  by  taxation  on  property.  In 
1868  the  reconstruction  convention  established  a  school  fund  amounting  to  more 
than  $2,000,000;  and  in  April,  1871,  the  Legislature  passed  an  Act  organizing 
a  system  of  public  free  schools,  and  the  schools  were  begun  in  September  of  the 
same  year. 

The  opposition  to  them  took  the  form  of  complaint  of  the  taxes,  and  in  most  of 
the  leading  cities  the  courts  were  overrun  with  petitions  asking  that  collection  of 
the  school  tax  be  restrained.  In  this  manner  the  progress  of  the  system  has  been 
very  much  embarrassed.  The  Texan  of  the  old  regime  cannot  understand  how 
it  is  right  that  he  should  be  taxed  for  the  education  of  his  neighbor's  children ; 
neither  is  he  willing  to  contribute  to  the  fund  for  educating  his  former  bondsmen. 


EDUCATION THE      BRAZOS      COUNTRY. 


135 


There  have  been  at  different  times  about  127,000  pupils  in  the  public  schools 
of  the  State,  and  the  average  number  taught  during  the  year  is  80,000,  while  the 
whole  number  of  children  in  the  commonwealth  is  estimated  at  228,355.  During 
the  first  year  of  the  application  of  the  system,  over  6,500  teachers  were  examined 
and  accepted.  The  number  of  colored  pupils  in  the  public  schools  cannot  be 
accurately  determined,  and  mixed  schools  seem  to  b*e  nowhere  insisted  upon. 
In  many  counties  where  the  opposition  to  the  payment  of  the  tax  was  persistent, 
the  schools  were  forced  to  close  altogether. 

In  the  large  towns,  as  in  Houston,  the  Germans  have  united  with  the 
leading  American  citizens  in  inaugurating  subscription  schools  in  which  the 
sexes  are  separated,  and  have  introduced  into  them  some  of  the  best  German 
methods.     There  has   been    much    objection   to  the  compulsory  feature  of  the 


"The  emigrant  wagon  is  a  familiar  sight  there."     [Page  136 


free  system,  parents  furiously  defending  their  right  to  leave  their  children 
in  ignorance.  Texas  needs,  and  intends  soon  to  found,  a  university  and  an 
agricultural  college.  The  latter  should  be  opened  at  once.  There  are  a  good 
many  thriving  denominational  schools  scattered  through  the  counties;  the 
Baptists  have  universities  at  Independence  and  Waco ;  the  Presbyterians  at 
Huntsville ;  the  Lutherans  at  Columbus ;  the  Methodists  at  Chappell  Hill ; 
and  the  Odd  Fellows  have  a  university  at  Bryan.  Wherever  the  public 
school  has  been  established  there  is  a  private  one  which  is  patronized  by  all 
the  old  settlers,  who  thus  gratify  their  desire  for  exclusiveness,  and  embarrass 
the  growth  of  the  free  system. 

Between  Austin  and  Hempstead  the  river  Brazos  is  crossed,  and  not  far  from 
its  banks  stands  the  populous  and  thriving  town  of  Brenham,   in  Washington 


I36  RICH  FARM  LANDS TEXAN  FOLIAGE. 

county,  one  of  the  wealthiest  and  most  thickly  settled  in  the  State.  The  beauty 
of  the  famous  La  Bahia  prairie  has  not  been  exaggerated ;  I  saw  its  fertile  lands 
where  the  great  oaks  stood  up  like  mammoth  sentinels ;  where  the  pecan-tree, 
the  pride  of  Texas,  and  one  of  the  noblest  monarchs  of  the  sylvan  creation, 
spread  his  broad  boughs ;  where  the  cotton-wood,  the  red  cedar,  and  the  ash  shot 
up  their  noble  stems ;  where  the  magnolia  and  the  holly  swore  friendship ;  where 
the  tangled  canebrake  usurped  the  soil,  and  where  upon  the  live  oak  the  grape- 
vine hung  lovingly  encircling  it  with  delicate  leaves  and  daintiest  tendrils.  How 
fair,  too,  were  the  carefully  cultivated  lands,  hedged  in  with  the  Osage  orange 
and  the  rose,  the  vineyards  and  the  pleasant  timber  lines  along  the  creeks ! 
What  beautiful  retreats  by  the  Brazos  !  One  might  fancy  himself  in  the  heart  of 
the  richest  farming  sections  of  England.  Tobacco,  rye,  hops,  hemp,  indigo, 
flax,  cotton,  corn,  wheat  and  barley,  as  well  as  richest  grapes,  can  be  profitably 
grown ;  deer  bound  through  the  forests,  wild  turkeys  stalk  in  the  thickets,  and 
grouse  and  quails  hide  in  the  bosquets.  The  emigrant  wagon  is  a  familiar  sight 
there,  and  the  wanderers  from  the  poorer  Southern  States  find  that  this  rich  tract 
realizes  their  wildest  dreams  of  Texas.  In  this  section  small  farms  are  rapidly 
increasing  in  number,  land  being  rented  to  new-comers  unable  to  buy. 

One's  senses  are  soon  dulled  by  satiety.  When  I  first  traversed  Texas,  fresh 
from  the  white,  snow-covered  fields  of  the  North,  how  strange  seemed  the  great 
cypresses,  hung  with  bearded  moss ;  the  tall  grasses  rustling  so  uncannily ;  the 
swamps,  with  their  rank  luxuriance  and  thousands  of  querulous  frogs  ;  the  clumps 
of  live  oaks,  and  the  tangled  masses  of  vines ! 

But  a  winter  in  the  South  had  familiarized  me  with  all  these  things,  and  on 
my  return  I  sought  in  vain  the  impressions  of  my  earlier  trip.  Extraordinary 
rural  charms  are  like  the  perfume  of  the  jessamine.  At  first  it  intoxicates  the 
senses,  but,  as  familiarity  grows,  it  ceases  to  attract  attention.  Even  absence 
will  not  re1'      ^^1  sweetness  and  subtlety. 


XIII. 

THE     TRUTH     ABOUT     TEXAS — THE     JOURNEY     BY     STAGE 
TO      SAN     ANTONIO. 

GALUSHA  A.  Grow,  once  speaker  of  the  national  House  of  Representatives, 
and  now  the  energetic  and  successful  manager  of  a  railroad  in  the  Lone 
Star  State,  has  changed  the  once  memorable  words,  "  Go  to  Texas !"  from  a 
malediction  into  a  beneficent  recommendation.  The  process  was  simple :  he 
placed  the  curt  phrase  at  the  head  of  one  of  those  flaming  posters  which  railway- 
companies  affect,  and  associated  it  with  such  ideas  of  lovely  climate  and  pros- 
pective prosperity,  that  people  forthwith  began  to  demand  if  it  were  indeed  true 
that  they  had  for  the  last  twenty  years  been  fiercely  dismissing  their  enemies 
into  the  very  Elysian  Fields,  instead  of  hurling  them  down  to  Hades. 

The  world  is  beginning  to  learn  something  of  the  fair  land  which  the  adven- 
turous Frenchmen  of  the  seventeenth  century  overran,  only  to  have  it  wrested 
from  them  by  the  cunning  and  intrigue  of  the  Spaniard ;  in  which  the  Fran- 
ciscan friars  toiled,  proselyting  Indians,  and  building  massive  garrison  missions; 
which  Aaron  Burr  dreamed  of  as  his  empire  of  the  south-west ;  and  into  which 
the  "Republican"  army  of  the  North  marched,  giving  presage  of  future 
American  domination. 

Austin  and  his  brave  fellow -colonists  rescued  Texas  fror  1ie  suicidal 
policy  of  the  Mexican  Government,  and  the  younger  Austin  c  ">ted  it  as 
his  patrimony,  elevating  it  from  the  degraded  and  useless  condition  in  which  the 
provincial  governors  had  held  it.  Under  his  lead,  it  spurned  from  its  side  its 
fellow- slave,  Coahuila,  and  broke  its  own  shackles,  throwing  them  in  the 
Mexican  tyrant  Guerrero's  face ;  its  small  but  noble  band  of  mighty  men 
making  the  names  of  San  Felipe,  of  Goliad,  of  the  Alamo,  of  Washington,  of 
San  Jacinto,  immortal. 

It  crushed  the  might  of  Santa  Anna,  the  Napoleon  of  the  West ;  it  wrested 
its  freedom  from  the  hard  hands  of  an  unforgiving  foe,  and  maintained  it,  as  an 
isolated  republic,  commanding  the  sympathy  and  respect  of  the  world ;  it  placed 
the  names  of  Houston,  of  Travis,  of  Fannin,  of  Bowie,  of  Milam,  of  Crockett, 
upon  the  roll  of  American  heroes  and  faithful  soldiers,  and  brought  to  the 
United  States  a  marriage-gift  of  two -hundred  and  thirty-seven  thousand  square 
miles  of  fertile  land. 

The  world  is  beginning  to  know  something  of  this  gigantic  south-western 
commonwealth  which  can  nourish  a  population  of  50,000,000 ;  whose  climate 
is  as  charming  as  that  of  Italy ;  whose  roses  bloom  and  whose  birds  sing  all 


I38  TEXAS     AS     IT     REALLY     IS. 

winter  long;  whose  soil  can  yield  the  fruits  of  all  climes,  and  whose  noble 
coast-line  is  broken  by  rivers  which  have  wandered  two  thousand  miles  in 
and  out  among  Texan  mountains  and  over  vast  Texan  plains.  It  is  a  region 
of  strange  contrasts  in  peoples  and  places :  you  step  from  the  civilization 
of  the  railway  junction  in  Denison  to  the  civilization  of  Mexico  of  the  seven- 
teenth century  in  certain  sections  of  San  Antonio ;  you  find  black,  sticky  land 
in  Northern  Texas,  incomparably  fertile;  and  sterile  plains,  which  give  the 
cattle  but  scant  living,  along  the  great  stretches  between  the  San  Antonio 
and   the    Rio    Grande. 

You  may  ride  in  one  day  from  odorous,  moss-grown'  forests,  where  everything 
is  of  tropic  fullness,  into  a  section  where  the-  mesquite  and  chaparral  dot  the 
gaunt  prairie  here  and  there ;  or  from  the  sea-loving  populations  of  Galveston 
and  her  thirty- mile  beach,  to  peoples  who  have  never  seen  a  mast  or  a  wave,  and 
whose  main  idea  of  water  is  that  it  is  something  difficult  to  find  and  agreeable  as 
a  beverage. 

The  State  has  been  much  and  unduly  maligned ;  has  been  made  a  by- word 
and  reproach,  whereas  it  should  be  a  source  of  pride  and  congratulation.  It  has 
had  the  imperfections  of  a  frontier  community,  but  has  thrown  off  the  majority  of 
them  even  while  the  outer  world  supposed  it  to  be  growing  worse  and  worse. 
Like  some  unfamiliar  fruit  supposed  to  be  bitter  and  nauseous,  it  has  gone  on 
ripening  in  obscurity  until,  bursting  its  covering,  it  stands  disclosed  a  thing  of 
passing  sweetness,  almost  beyond  price. 

Much  of  the  criticism  to  which  Texas  has  been  subjected  has  come  from  peo- 
ple very  little  acquainted  with  its  actual  condition.  Border  tales  have  been 
magnified  and  certified  to  as  literally  true.  The  people  of  the  North  and  of 
Europe  have  been  told  that  the  native  Texan  was  a  walking  armament,  and  that 
his  only  argument  was  a  pistol-shot  or  the  thrust  of  a  bowie-knife.  The  Texan 
has  been  paraded  on  the  English  and  French  stages  as  a  maudlin  ruffian,  sober 
only  in  savagery;  and  the  vulgar  gossipings  of  insincere  scribes  have  been 
allowed  to  prejudice  hundreds  of  thousands  of  people. 

Now  that  the  State  is  bound  by  iron  bands  to  the  United  States,  now  that, 
under  good  management  and  with  excellent  enterprise,  it  is  assuming  its  proper 
place,  the  truth  should  be  told.  Of  course,  it  will  be  necessary  to  say  some  dis- 
agreeable things;  to  make  severe  strictures  upon  certain  people  and  classes  of 
people ;  but  that  is  not,  by  any  means,  to  condemn  the  State  by  wholesale  or  to 
write  of  it  in  a  hostile  spirit.  The  first  impression  to  be  corrected — a  very  fool- 
ish and  inexcusably  narrow  one,  which  has,  nevertheless,  taken  strong  hold  upon 
the  popular  mind — is,  that  travel  in  Texas,  for  various  indefinite  reasons,  is 
everywhere  unsafe.  Nothing  could  be  more  erroneous ;  there  is  only  one  section 
where  the  least  danger  may  be  apprehended,  and  that  is  vaguely  known  as  the 
"Indian  country."  Hostile  Comanches,  L4pans,  or  predatory  Kickapoos  might 
rob  you  of  your  cherished  scalp  if  you  were  to  venture  into  their  clutches  ;  but  in 
less  than  three  years  they  will  have  vanished  before  the  locomotive — or,  possibly 
before  the  legions  of  Uncle  Sam,  who  has  a  pronounced  mania  for  removing  his 
frontier  quite  back  to  the  mountains  of  Mexico. 


THE     CHARACTER     OF     THE     TEXAS    PEOPLE.  I39 

Indeed,  this  apprehension  with  regard  to  safety  for  life  and  property  in  Texas 
is  all  the  more  inexplicable  from  the  very  fact  that  the  great  mass  of  the  citizens 
of  the  State  were  and  are  determined  to  maintain  law  and  order,  and  to  fight  with 
bitter  persistence  the  outlaws  who  have  found  their  way  into  the  country. 

It  is  true  that  during  the  war,  and  for  two  years  thereafter,  things  were  in 
lamentable  condition.  Outlaws  and  murderers  infested  the  high-roads,  robbed 
remote  hamlets,  and  enacted  jail  deliveries.  There  were  a  thousand  murders  per 
year  within  the  State  limits ;  but  at  the  end  of  the  two  years  the  reconstruction 
government  had  got  well  at  work,  and  annihilated  the  murderers  and  robbers. 

It  is  a  noteworthy  fact,  too,  that  the  people  then  murdered  were  mainly  the 
fellows  of  the  very  ruffians  who  murdered  them — shot  down  in  drunken  broils,  or 
stabbed  in  consequence  of  some  thievish  quarrel.  Of  course,  innocent  people 
were  occasionally  plundered  and  killed ;  but  then,  as  now,  most  of  the  men  who 
"  died  with  their  boots  on  "  were  professional  scoundrels,  of  whom  the  world  was 
well  rid. 

It  may  with  truth  be  said  that  there  exists  in  all  of  the  extreme  Southern 
States  a  class  of  so-called  gentlemen  who  employ  the  revolver  rather  suddenly 
when  they  fancy  themselves  offended,  sometimes  killing,  now  and  then  only 
frightening  an  opponent.  These  people  are  not,  as  yet,  treated  with  sufficient 
rigor  in  Texan  society.  There  are  even  instances  of  men  who  have  killed  a  num- 
ber of  persons  and  are  still  considered  respectable.  The  courts  do  not  mete  out 
punishment  in  such  cases  with  proper  severity,  sometimes  readily  acquitting 
men  who  have  wantonly  and  willfully  shot  their  fellow- creatures  on  the  slightest 
provocation. 

A  correct  summary  of  the  present  condition  of  Texas  may,  it  seems  to  me, 
be  stated  as  follows :  A  commonwealth  of  unlimited  resources  and  with  unri- 
valed climate,  inhabited  by  a  brave,  impulsive,  usually  courteous  people,  by  no 
means  especially  bitter  on  account  of  the  war,  who  comprise  all  grades  of  society, 
from  the  polished  and  accomplished  scholar,  ambassador,  and  man. of  large 
means,  to  the  rough,  unkempt,  semi-barbaric  tiller  of  the  soil  or  herder  of  cattle, 
who  is  content  with  bitter  coffee  and  coarse  pork  for  his  sustenance,  and  with  a 
low  cabin,  surrounded  with  a  scraggy  rail  fence,  for  his  home. 

The  more  ambitious  and  cultured  of  the  native  Texans  have  cordially  joined 
with  the  newly- come  Northerners  and  Europeans  in  making  improvements,  in 
toning  up  society  in  some  places,  and  toning  it  down  in  others ;  in  endeavoring 
to  compass  wise  legislation  with  regard  to  the  distribution  of  lands,  and  the  com- 
plete control  of  even  the  remote  sections  of  the  State  by  the  usual  machinery  of 
courts  and  officials;  and  in  the  binding  together  and  consolidation  of  the  interests 
of  the  various  sections  by  the  rapid  increase  of  railway  lines. 

It  was  a  charming  morning  in  April  that  I  climbed  to  the  high  box-seat  by 
the  driver  of  the  San  Antonio  stage,  and  sat  perched  above  four  sleek  and  strong 
horses  in  front  of  the  Raymond  House,  at  Austin,  the  Texan  capital. 

Heavy  heat  was  coming  with  the  growing  day ;  the  hard,  white  roads  glis- 
tened under  the  fervid  sun,  and  the  patches  of  live  oak  stood  out  in  bold  relief 
against  a  cloudless  sky.     The  shopkeepers  were  lolling  under  their  awnings,  in 


140 


EN      ROUTE      FOR      SAN     ANTONIO. 


lazy  enjoyment  of  the  restful  morning,  and  a  group  of  Mexicans,  lounging 
by  a  wall,  cast  wild  glances  at  us  from  beneath  their  broad  sombreros  and 
their  tangled  and  matted  black  hair.  In  the  distance,  Mount  Bonnel  showed  a 
fragment  of  its  rock-strewn  summit,  and  white  stone  houses  peered  from  the  dark 

green  of  the  foliage,  while 
the  State  House,  crowning 
a  high  knoll,  and  flanked 
on  either  side  by  the  Land 
Office  and  the  Governor's 
Mansion,  hid  from  us  the 
view  of  the  rich  plain,  ex- 
tending back  to  the  bases 
of  the  hills  which  form  an 
amphitheatre  in  whose 
midst  Austin  is  prettily 
set   down. 

Nine  inside  and  three 
outside.  "Now,  then, 
driver,  are  you  ready? 
Here  is  your  way-bill; 
here  are  half-a-dozen  mail 
bags ;  ballast  up  carefully, 
or    you    will     have    your 

Sunning  themselves.  —  "A  group  of  Mexicans,  lounging  by  a  wall."  COach  Upset  !  "      The  driver 

a  nut-brown   man,  handsome    and    alert   withal,   clad    in    blue    overalls,  velvet 
coat,   and    black    slouch    hat,    springs    lightly    into    his    seat,    cracks    his    long 
whip-lash,    and   we   plunge    away    toward    the    steep  banks    of   the    Colorado, 
bound  for  an  eighty-mile  stage  ride  to  the  venerable  and  picturesque  city  of. 
San  Antonio. 

Rattle !  we  are  at  the  bank,  and  must  all  dismount  to  walk  down  the  decliv- 
ity, and  cross  the  almost  waterless  river  channel  on  a  pontoon  bridge.  We  toil 
painfully  across  a  sandy  waste,  and  then  up  the  bank  on  the  other  side,  turning 
to  look  at  the  town  behind  us,  while  the  horses  pant  below. 

A  cavalcade  of  hunters  passes  us,  mounted  on  lithe  little  horses  and  grave, 
sure-footed  mules,  returning  toward  Austin.  The  men  are  brown  with  the  sun, 
and  carry  rifles-  poised  across  their  high-peaked  Mexican  saddles.  Their  limbs 
are  cased  in  undressed  skin  leggings,  and  their  heads  are  covered  with  broad 
hats,  entwined  with  silver  braids.  Each  man  bows  courteously,  and  all  canter- 
briskly  down  to  the  stream. 

Mounting  once  more  to  our  perches,  beside  the  driver,  artist  and  writer  alike 
are  inspired  by  the  beauty  of  the  long  stretch  of  dark  highway,  bordered  and 
covered  with  huge  live  oaks,  or  with  the  wayward  mesquite,  whose  branches  are 
a  perpetual  danger  to  the  heads  of  outside  passengers. 

The  driver  nervously  inspects  us  ;  then  lights  a  cigar,  and,  in  a  gentle  voice, 
appeals  to  his  horses  with  :    "  Git  up,  ye  saddle  critturs  !  " — evidently  a   mild 


SCENES      BY     THE     WAY SAN      ANTONIO'S      LOCATION. 


HI 


ii. 


'reproach.  The  saddle  critturs  dash  forward  at  a  rapid  gait.  Each  glossy 
flank  is  branded  with  the  name  by  which  the  animal  is  known ;  and  when- 
ever a  leader  lags  or  a  wheel  horse  shows  a  disposition  to  be  skittish,  the 
loud  voice  says,  "You  Pete  !"  or  "Oh  Mary!"  and  Pete  and  Mary  alike  prick 
up  their  pretty  ears  with  new  energy.  The  driver's  tones  never  rise  beyond 
entreaty  or  derision ;  and  the  animals  seem  to  feel  each  stricture  upon  their 
conduct   keenly. 

So  we  hasten  on,  past  pretty  farm-houses  with  neat  yards,  where  four-year- 
old  boys  are  galloping  on  frisky  horses,  or  driving  the  cattle  or  sheep  afield ; 
past  the  suburbs  of  Austin,  and  out  into  the  open  country,  until  we  have  left 
all  houses  behind,  and  only  encounter  from  time  to  time  wagons,  drawn  by 
oxen,  and  loaded  with  barrels  and  boxes,  with  lumber  and  iron,  toiling  at  the 
rate  of  twenty  miles  a  day  toward  the  West.  Behind  each  of  the  wagons 
marches  a  tough  little 
horse,  neatly  saddled ; 
and  a  forlorn  dog  with  a 
general  air  of  wolfishness 
about  him,  and  showing 
his  teeth  as  we  dash 
past,  brings  up  the  rear. 

Presently  the  driver 
turns  to  us  with,  "I'm  a 
dreadful  good  hand  to 
talk,  if  ye've  got  any 
cigars."  Then,  in 
another  breath,  "  From 
New  York,  hey  ?  Ain't 
ye  afraid  to  come  away  out  here  alone?"  (Implying  a  scorn  for  the  outside 
impression  of  Texan  travel.)  A  moment  after,  in  a  tone  of  infinite  compassion, 
as  if  regarding  Gotham  as  a  place  to  be  pitied,  driver  adds : 

"  Wal,  I  s'pose  thar  are  some  good  souls  thar"  (confidentially);  "I've  hauled 
more  'n  two  thousand  o'  them  New  Yorkers  over  to  San  Anton  within  the  last 
year.  Heap  o'  baggage.  We  told  one  young  feller  on  the  box  here,  one  day, 
lots  of  Injun  stories,  just  as  it  was  gittin  dark.  Reckon  he  was  n't  much  afeared. 
Oh,  no!"  Suppressed  merriment  lurking  in  the  handsome  brown  face.  "You 
Pete  !  you  ain't  fit  for  chasin'  Injuns  !     Git  up  !  " 

San  Antonio  is  2,270  miles  from  New  York  by  present  lines  of  rail  and  stage, 
and  is  situated  in  one  of  the  garden  spots  of  South-western  Texas.  To  the  newly- 
arrived  Northerner,  Galveston  certainly  seems  the  ultima-antipode  of  Gotham ; 
but  once  across  the  Brazos  and  the  Colorado,  and  well  into  the  fertile  plains  and 
among  the  glorious  prairies  of  Western  and  South-western  Texas,  the  sense  of 
remoteness,  of  utter  contrast,  is  a  thousand-fold  more  impressive.  To  think, 
while  clinging  to  the  swaying  stage-seat,  that  one  may  journey  on  in  this  pleasant 
way  for  eight  hundred  miles  still  within  Texan  limits,  gives,  moreover,  a  grand 
idea  of  the  great  State's  extent. 


"We  encounter  wagons  drawn  by  oxen. 


142  A     HALT A     FORD IMMIGRANTS. 

Whirling  thus,  hour  by  hour,  away  from  railroads,  from  houses,  taverns,  and* 
bridges,  and  beaver-hatted  and  silk-bedizened  folk,  one  cannot  resist  the  growing 
feeling  that  he  is  in  a  foreign  land,  and  as  he  sees  the  wild-eyed  children  staring 
at  him  from  the  fields,  or  notes  the  horseman  coursing  by,  with  clang  and  clatter 
of  spur  and  arms,  he  has  a  vague  expectation  that  if  addressed  it  will  be  in  a 
foreign  tongue. 

A  halt: — at  a  small  stone  house,  through  whose  open  door  one  sees  a  curious 
blending  of  country-store,  farm-house  and  post-office.  Here  the  mail  for  the 
back-country  is  delivered.  "  Morning,  Judge,"  from  a  lean  by-stander,  medita- 
tively chewing  tobacco,  to  an  outside  passenger.  "  Got  them  radical  judges 
impeached  yet  ?  Driver,  won't  you  bring  me  a  copy  of  the  Texas  Almanac  next 
time  you  come  out?  Reckon  I  kin  use  it."  A  drove  of  pigs  curiously  inspect 
the  open  entrance  to  the  store,  whereupon  two  dogs  charge  them,  flank  the 
youngest  of  the  swine,  and  teach  them  manners  at  the  expense  of  their  ears. 

Lime-flavored  water  is  brought  in  a  tin  dipper  and  passed  around ;  such  of 
the  passengers  as  choose,  perfume  the  vessel  with  a  drop  of  whiskey.  "  Wal ! 
sha'n't  git  ye  to  San  Antonio  'fore  this  time  to-morrow,  if  ye  drink  the  rivers  all 
dry,"  is  the  mild  remonstrance.     As  we  move  off,  the  driver  vouchsafes : 

"Thar  was  Mose — Judge,  you  remember  Mose;  he  would  n't  let  no  stranger 
talk  to  him,  he  wouldn't.  Crossest  man  on  this  line;  had  a  right  smart  o'  swear- 
words :  used  'em  mostly  to  hosses,  tho' !  Had  one  horse  that  was  ugly,  and 
always  tied  his  tail  to  the  tlrace*.  Outsides  mostly  always  asked  him  :  '  What  do 
you  tie  that  horse's  tail  to  the  trace  for  ? '  You  oughter  hear  Mose  answer. 
Took  him  half  an  hour  to  get  the  swear- words  out.  One  day,  a  feller  from  New 
York  went  over  with  Mose,  and  did  n't  say  a  word  about  the  horse's  tail  all  the 
way  to  the  relay ;  when  they  got  to  the  unhitching  place,  Mose  offered  the  New 
Yorker  half  a  dollar — 'Stranger,'  he  says,  'I  reckon  you've  gin  me  that  worth  of 
peace  of  mind;  you  are  the  first  man  that  never  asked  me  nothing  about  that'ar 
critter's  tail.'" 

A  ford,  the  sinuous  road  leading  to  the  edge  of  a  rapidly- rushing  streamlet, 
on  whose  banks,  among  the  white  stones,  lie  the  skeletons  of  cattle  perished  by 
the  wayside  !  Buzzards  hovering  groundward  indicate  some  more  recent  demise. 
Ah!  a  poor  dog,  whose  feet  no  longer  wearily  plod  after  the  wagon  train.  The 
collar  is  gone  from  his  neck,  some  lonely  man  having  taken  it  as  a  remembrance 
of  his  faithful  companion. 

A  mocking-bird  sings  in  some  hidden  nook ;  a  chaparral  cock  runs  tamely 
before  us,  fanning  the  air  with  his  gray  plumes,  and  gazing  curiously  at  the  buz- 
zards. An  emigrant  wagon  is  lumbering  through  the  shallow,  bluish- green 
water ;  the  children  of  yonder  grim-bearded  father  are  wading  behind  it :  insider 
the  mother  lies  ill  on  a  dirty  mattress.  Two  old  chairs,  with  pots  and  kettles,  a 
Winchester  rifle,  a  sack  of  flour,  and  a  roll  of  canvas,  are  strung  at  the  wagon's 
back.  The  horses  display  their  poor  old  ribs  through  their  hides,  and  their 
tongues  protrude  under  the  intense  heat. 

Our  steeds  splash  through  the  stream.  We  come  upon  a  Mexican  camp, 
where  a  group  of  lazy  peons,  who  have  wandered  across  from  Mexico,  braving 


A      MEXICAN      CAMP THE    CAMPAGNA. 


143 


danger  and  death  daily,  have  at  last  found  a  safe  haven.  The  dingy  father 
sleeps  under  his  little  cart.  His  mules  crop  the  dry  grass,  tethered  near  a 
small,  filthy  tent,  wherein  reposes  an  Indian  girl,  with  a  cherub-child's  head 
resting  upon  her  exquisite  arm.  A  gipsy-looking  hag  is  munching  dried  meat 
before  a  little  fire  where  coffee  is  boiling. 

Now  along  a  rolling  prairie,  in  a  route  disfigured  by  what  is  known  as  the 
"  hog- wallow;  "  then,  up  to  a  range  of  hills  :  and  0 gioja!  the  matchless  beauty 
of  a  wide  expanse  of  vale  below  filled  with  masses  of  dense  foliage,  and  beyond, 
forest-clad  hills  peered  down  upon  by  a  blue,  misty  range,  far  away.  A  com- 
fortable farm-house  crowns  the  hill  up  which  we  climb;  shepherds  are  driving 
flocks  of  sheep  afield ;  horsemen  are  mounting  and  dismounting ;  bright-eyed 
maidens  flit  about   the    yard,  bareheaded    and    barearmed ;    half-naked    negro 


'Here  and  there  we  pass  a  hunter's  camp." 


children  tumble  about  on  the  turf,  and  little  white  boys  on  ponies  play  at 
Comanche.  Majestic  waves  of  sunlight  flit  across  the  valley;  the  campagna  to 
which  we  are  now  coming  swims  in  the  delicious  effulgence  of  the  perfect  Texas 
April  noon.  Here  and  there  we  pass  a  hunter's  camp.  We  spin  forward  mer- 
rily, having  had  plenty  of  relays  of  fresh  horses,  and  put  the  Blanco  river  behind 
us  almost  without  wetting  their  hoofs,  so  low  is  it ;  though  in  times  of  freshet  it 
holds  the  whole  country  round  in  terror  for  weeks. 

A  halt  for  dinner,  which  is  served  in  a  long,  cool  kitchen  ;  a  swart  girl  stand- 
ing at  one  end  and  a  swart  boy  at  the  other.  Each  agitates  a  long  stick  adorned 
with  strips  of  paper,  and  thus  a  breeze  is  kept  up  and  the  flies  are  driven  off. 
Buttermilk,  corn-bread,  excellent  meat,  and  the  inevitable  coffee  are  the  concom- 

10 


144  SAN     MARCOS  —  NEW     BRAUNFELS. 

itants  of  the  meal.  The  landlady  stares  at  the  paper-currency  offered,  as  only 
gold  and  silver  are  known  in  this  section.  The  farmer  comes  in  from  the  field 
for  his  dinner,  and  his  pleasant,  homely  talk  recalls  one  to  America.  After  all, 
then,  this  is  not  a  foreign  land.  "Stage  ready;  come,  now,  if  ye  want  to  git 
anywhar  to-night !" 

Onward  to  the  San  Marcos,  another  small,  but  immensely  powerful  stream, 
running  through  rich  lands,  and  passing  hard  by  the  prosperous  town  of  San 
Marcos,  the  shire  of  a  county  whose  best  products  are  cotton,  corn,  and  sorghum. 
The  river,  which  has  its  source  not  far  from  the  town,  and  near  the  old  home- 
stead of  Gen.  Burleson,  the  noted  Indian  fighter,  affords  water-power  which 
cannot  fail  to  tempt  Northern  capital  some  day.  Wood  and  building-stone  of 
the  best  quality  are  abundant;  San  Marcos  may  yet  be  a  second  Lawrence  or 
Manchester.  We  pass  the  court-house  and  the  Coronal  Institute ;  pass  the  long 
street  lined  with  pretty  dwellings,  and  ride  forward  all  the  hot  afternoon  towards 
the  Guadalupe. 

The  fields,  in  which  the  corn  is  already  half  a  foot  high,  are  black;  the  soil  is 
like  fruit-cake.  In  obscure  corners  we  find  little  cabins — erected  by  the  Mexi- 
cans who  abound  along  the  way.  Toward  sunset  we  come  upon  neat  stone 
houses,  with  quaint  German  roofs.  "Everything  Dutch  now,"  ejaculates  the 
driver,  and  indeed  we  are  about  to  see  what  German  industry  and  German  thrift 
have  done  for  Western  Texas. 

The  stage  rumbles  on  through  the  "lane"  which  extends  for  miles  on  either 
side  of  New  Braunfels,  bounded  by  fertile,  well-fenced,  well-cultivated  fields,  such 
as  the  eye  of  even  a  New  England  farmer  never  rested  upon.  It  is  dark  as  we 
rattle  past  the  cottages ;  the  German  families,  mother,  father,  and  the  whole 
gamut  of  children,  from  four  to  fourteen,  are  coming  in  from  work. 

The  women  have  been  afield  ploughing,  with  the  reins  round  their  necks  and 
the  plough  handles  grasped  in  their  strong  hands.  Yet  they  are  not  uncouth  or 
ungracious ;  their  faces  are  ruddy ,  their  hair,  blown  backward  by  the  evening 
breeze,  falls  gracefully  about  their  strong  shoulders.  Surely,  this  is  better  than 
the  tenement  house  in  the  city  ! 

At  last  we  reach  the  Comal,  and  crossing  its  foamy,  greenish-blue  waters, 
rattle  on  to  New  Braunfels,  the  cheery  town  which  the  German  Immigration 
Company  settled  in  1845,  an^  which  is  now  an  orderly  and  wealthy  community 
of  4,000  inhabitants,  set  down  in  the  midst  of  a  county  which  has  probably 
10,000  residents. 

The  Germans  were  the  pioneers  in  this  section,  endured  many  hardships,  and 
had  many  adventures,  many  battles  with  the  Indians,  before  they  were  allowed  to 
push  forward  from  New  Braunfels  and  create  other  settlements.  As  we  enter  the 
long  main  street  of  the  town,  the  lights  from  the  cottage  doors  gleam  forth 
cheerily.  The  village  maidens  are  walking  two  by  two  with  their  arms  about  each 
others'  waists,  and  crooning  little  melodies,  and  the  men  are  smoking  long  pipes 
at  the  gates.  Suddenly  we  dash  up  to  the  hotel,  and  a  pleasant-faced  old 
gentleman,  in  a  square  silk  cap,  hastens  to  welcome  us  into  a  bright  room,  where 
little  groups  of  Germans  sit  ranged  about  clean  tables,  drinking  their  foaming 


THE     COMAL A     NIGHT     RIDE.  145 

beer  from  shiniest  of  glasses.  Are  we  then  in  Germany  ?  Nay ;  for  supper  is 
spread  in  yonder  hall,  and  the  new  driver  whom  we  took  up  at  the  last  relay  is 
calling  upon  us,  in  our  English  tongue,  to  make  haste. 

New  Braunfels  bears  as  many  evidences  of  wealth  and  prosperity  as  any  town 
in  the  Middle  States.  It  has  always  been  liberal  in  sentiment,  and  for  many 
years  boasted  of  having  the  only  free  school  in  Texas.  The  shrewd  Germans 
have  taken  advantage  of  the  admirable  water-power  of  the  Comal  and  Guadalupe, 
and  have  established  manufactories  in  the  county. 

The  Comal,  one  of  the  most  beautiful  streams  in  Texas,  gushes  out  at  the  foot 
of  a  mountain  range  not  far  from  New  Braunfels,  from  a  vast  number  of  springs; 
and  from  its  sources  to  its  confluence  with  the  Guadalupe,  a  distance  of  three 
miles,  has  forty  feet  of  fall,  and  mill- sites  enough  for  a  regiment  of  capitalists. 
Indeed  it  is  easy  to  see  that  the  place  will,  at  some  future  time,  become  a  great 
manufacturing  centre.  White  labor  is  easily  obtained,  and  the  community  is 
peaceful  and  law-abiding. 

A  large  cotton  factory  was  established  on  the  Comal  some  years  ago,  but  was 
destroyed  by  an  exceptionally  disastrous  tornado  in  1869.  There  are  many 
water-mills  in  the  county,  all  engaged  in  the  manufacture  of  flour  for  export  via 
the  port  of  Indianola,  settled  by  the  same  immigration  company  which  founded 
New  Braunfels,  or  via  Lavaca.  The  trees  along  the  river  and  creek  bottoms  are 
almost  overborne  with  the  mustang  grape;  the  county  abounds  in  fruit,  while 
cotton,  corn,  and  the  other  cereals  are  raised  in  profusion.  Irrigation  is  not 
difficult. 

It  is  quite  dark,  and  a  cool  night  wind  is  blowing  when  we  mount  once  more 
to  the  coach-top,  and  settle  ourselves  for  a  ride  which  will  last  until  two  in  the 
morning.  The  driver  cracks  his  long  whip,  and  we  plunge  into  the  darkness. 
The  two  great  lamps  of  the  coach  cast  a  bright  light  for  twenty  feet  ahead,  and 
we  can  see  little  patches  of  the  landscape,  beyond  which  is  the  infinite  darkness 
relieved  only  here  and  there  by  the  yellow  of  camp-fires,  or  by  the  fitful  gleams 
of  the  fire-flies.  At  last  we  strike  across  the  prairie.  The  mesquite-trees,  which 
we  pass  every  moment,  look  white  and  ghostly  in  the  lamplight,  and  flit  by  us 
like  a  legion  of  restless  spirits.  Then,  too,  as  the  horses  trot  steadily  forward, 
there  is  the  illusion  that  we  are  approaching  a  great  city,  so  like  are  the  innumer- 
able fire-flies  to  the  gaslights  of  a  metropolis.  Now  we  are  in  a  stable-yard,  in 
the  midst  of  a  clump  of  mesquite  and  oak-trees ;  the  tired  horses  are  unhitched, 
fresh  ones  replace  them,  and  away  we  go  again  over  the  prairies.  Presently  the 
architecture  changes;  the  little  houses,  dimly  seen  at  the  roadside,  from  time  to 
time,  are  low,  flat-roofed,  and  built  of  white  stone ;  there  are  long  stone  walls, 
over  which  foliage  scrambles  in  most  picturesque  fashion,  while,  sprinkled  in  here 
and  there,  are  the  shabby  Mexican  cottages,  with  thatched  roofs  and  mud  floors. 
There  is  a  hint  of  moonlight  as  we  approach  the  hills,  and  we  can  see  the  cattle 
in  relief  against  the  sky,  hundreds  of  them  lying  comfortably  asleep,  or  starting 
up  as  they  hear  the  rattle  of  the  coach,  and  brandishing  their  horns  or  flourishing 
their  tails.  Faster,  faster  flit  the  mesquite  ghosts ;  faster  fly  away  the  oaks  and 
the  chaparral ;  and  faster  the  little  streams  which  we  speed  across.      Now  we 


146 


THE     ARRIVAL     AT     SAN     ANTONIO. 


mount  upon  a  high  table-land,  from  which  we  can  see,  faintly  denned  in  the 
distance,  a  range  of  hills,  and  can  catch  a  glimpse  of  the  beautiful  valley  at  their 
feet.  The  hours  pass  rapidly  by;  the  night  breeze  is  inspiring,  and  the  driver  is 
singing  little  songs;  we  dash  into  a  white  town;  pass  a  huge  "corral,"  inside 


"We  pass  groups  of  stone  houses." 

which  stand  blue  army  wagons  drawn  up  in  line ;  pass  groups  of  stone  houses, 
then  into  a  long  street,  thickly  lined  with  dwellings,  set  down  in  the  midst  of 
delicious  gardens ;  scent  the  perfume  drifting  from  the  flower-beds ;  climb  a 
little  hill,  whirl  into  a  Spanish-looking  square,  and  descend,  cramped  in  limb  and 
sore  in  bone,  at  the  portal  of  the  Menger  House,  in  the  good  old  city  of  San 
Antonio,  the  pearl  of  Texas, 


XIV. 


AMONG  THE   OLD    SPANISH   MISSIONS. 

THE  great  State  of  Texas  is  usually  spoken  of  by  its  inhabitants  as  divided 
into  eight  sections — namely,  Northern,  Eastern,  Middle,  Western,  Ex- 
treme South-western,  and  North-western  Texas,  the  Mineral  Region,  and  the 
"Pan  Handle."  This  latter  section,  which  embraces  more  than  20,000  square 
miles,  is  at  present  inhabited  almost  entirely  by  Indians.  The  mineral  region 
proper,  believed  to  be  exceedingly  rich  in  iron  and  copper  ores,  comprises  50,000 


'The  vast  pile  of  ruins  known  as  the  San  Jos6  Mission."       [Page  154.] 


square  miles.  The  vast  section  between  the  San  Antonio  river  and  the  Rio 
Grande — as  well  as  the  stretch  of  seven  hundred  miles  of  territory  between  San 
Antonio  and  El  Paso,  on  the  Mexican  frontier,  is  given  up  to  grazing  herds  of 
cattle,  horses,  and  sheep,  to  the  hardy  stock-raiser,  and  to  the  predatory  Indian 
and  Mexican.  Across  the  plains  runs  the  famous  "old  San  Antonio  road,"  which, 
for  150  years,  has  been  the  most  romantic  route  upon  the  western  continent  The 
highway  between  Texas  and  Mexico,  what  expeditions  of  war,  of  plunder,  of 
savage  revenge,  have  traversed  it !  What  heroic  soldiers  of  liberty  have  lost  their 
lives  upon  it !  What  mean  and  brutal  massacres  have  been  perpetrated  along  its 
dusty  stretches !  What  ghostly  processions  of  friar  and  arquebusier,  of  sandaled 
Mexican  soldier  and  tawny  Comanche ;  of  broad-hatted,  buckskin-breeched  vol- 


I48  THE     PEOPLE     OF     SAN     ANTONIO. 

unteer  for  Texan  liberty;  of  gaunt  emigrant,  or  fugitive  from  justice,  with  pistols 
at  his  belt  and  a  Winchester  at  his  saddle ;  of  Confederate  gray  and  Union  blue, 
seem  to  dance  before  one's  eyes  as  he  rides  over  it!  The  romance  of  the  road 
and  of  its  tributaries  is  by  no  means  finished ;  there  is  every  opportunity  for  the 
adventurous  to  throw  themselves  into  the  midst  of  danger  even  within  forty 
miles  of  "  San  Anton,"  as  the  Texans  lovingly  call  the  old  town ;  and  sometimes 
in  the  shape  of  mounted  Indians,  the  danger  comes  galloping  into  the  very 
suburbs  of  San  Antonio  itself. 

San  Antonio  is  the  only  town  in  the  United  States  which  has  a  thoroughly 
European  aspect,  and,  in  its  older  quarters,  is  even  more  like  some  remote  and 
obscure  town  in  Spain  than  like  any  of  the  bustling  villages  of  France  or  Ger- 
many, with  which  the  "  grand  tour"  traveler  is  familiar.  Once  arrived  in  it,  and 
safely  ensconced  among  the  trees  and  flowerets  on  Flores  street,  or  on  any  of 
the  lovely  avenues  which  lead  from  it  into  the  delicious  surrounding  country, 
— there  seems  a  barrier  let  down  to  shut  out  the  outer  world ;  the  United  States 
is  as  a  strange  land. 

In  San  Antonio,  too,  as  in  Nantucket,  you  may  hear  people  speak  of  "  going 
to  the  States,"  "the  news  from  the  States,"  etc.,  with  utmost  gravity  and  good 
faith.  The  interests  of  the  section  are  not  so  identified  with  those  of  the 
country  to  which  it  belongs  as  to  lead  to  the  same  intense  curiosity  about 
American  affairs  that  one  finds  manifested  in  Chicago,  St.  Louis,  and  even  in 
Galveston.  People  talk  more  about  the  cattle-trade,  the  Mexican  thievery 
question,  the  invasion  of  Mexico  by  the  French,  the  prospect  of  the  opening  up 
of  silver  mines,  than  of  the  rise  and  fall  of  the  political  mercury ;  and  the  general 
government  comes  in  for  consideration  and  criticism  only  when  the  frontier 
defenses  or  the  Mexican  boundaries  are  discussed.  "What  general  was  that 
down  yer  with  Gin'ral  Sherman?"  said  a  man  to  me  at  an  out-of-the-way  town  in 
Western  Texas.  "Reckon  that  was  one  o'  your  Northern  gin'rals."  As  he  had  no 
interest  in  following  Cabinet  changes,  he  had  never  heard  of  Secretary  Belknap. 

Although  everything  which  is  brought  to  San  Antonio  from  the  outer  world 
toils  over  many  miles  of  stage  or  wagon  transit,  the  people  are  well  provided 
with  literature ;  but  that  does  not  bring  them  closer  to  the  United  States. 
Nothing  but  a  railroad  ever  will ;  and  against  the  idea  of  the  railroad  soon  to 
reach  them  the  majority  of  the  elder  population  rebels.  Steaming  and  snorting 
engines  to  defile  the  pure  air,  and  disturb  the  grand  serenity  of  the  vast  plains ! 
No,  indeed ;  not  if  the  Mexicans  could  have  their  way,  the  older  Mexicans,  the 
apparently  immortal  old  men  and  women  who  are  preserved  in  Chili  pepper,  and 
who,  as  their  American  neighbors  say,  have  been  taught  that  they  will  have 
but  short  shrift  when  the  railways  do  come.  "  It  will  bring  you  all  sorts  of  epi- 
demics, and  all  kinds  of  noxious  diseases,"  they  have  been  told  by  those  inter- 
ested to  prevent  the  road's  building.  And  this  the  venerable  moneyed  Mexicans 
actually  consider  a  valid  reason  for  opposition,  since  San  Antonio  now  has  the 
reputation  of  being  the  healthiest  town  on  the  American  continent. 

The  local  proverb  says,  "  If  you  wish  to  die  here,  you  must  go  somewhere 
else ;"  and,  although  the  logic  is  a  little  mixed,  it  certainly  has  a  fond  de  verite. 


A      SUPERB     CLIMATE — SAN      ANTONIO   S     HISTORY.  I49 

For  many  years  consumptives  have  been  straying  into  San  Antonio,  apparently 
upon  their  very  last  legs,  only  to  find  renewed  life  and  vigor  in  the  superb 
climate  of  Western  Texas ;  and  so  certain  are  consumptives  and  other  invalids  to 
be  cured  in  the  city  and  the  surrounding  region,  that  retreats  and  quiet 
residences  for  people  to  enshrine  themselves  in  during  recovery  are  going  up 
in  all  quarters.  A  few  of  the  golden  mornings — a  few  of  the  restful  evenings, 
when  the  odorous  shadows  come  so  gently  that  one  cannot  detect  their  approach 
— and  one  learns  the  charm  of  this  delightful  corner  of  the  world. 

San  Antonio  is  the  cradle  of  Texan  liberty.  Its  streets  and  the  highways 
leading  to  it  have  been  drenched  with  the  blood  of  brave  soldiers.  Steal  out 
with  me  into  the  fields  this  rosy  morning,  friends,  and  here,  at  the  head  of  the 
San  Antonio  river,  on  this  joyous  upland,  at  the  foot  of  the  Guadalupe  mount- 
ains whence  flow  a  thousand  sweet  springs,  and  overlooking  the  old  town,  hear 
a  bit  about  its  history  and  the  early  struggles  of  the  Texans. 

France  was  a  great  gainer  for  a  short  time  by  the  fortunate  accident  which  in 
1684  threw  De  La  Salle's  fleet  into  the  bay  of  San  Fernando,  on  the  Gulf  of 
Mexico,  during  his  voyage  from  La  Rochelle  to  take  possession  of  the  mouths  of 
the  Mississippi  in  the  name  of  the  king  of  France.  De  La  Salle  virtually  opened 
Texas.  After  he  had  discovered  his  error  in  reckoning,  and  that  he  was  on  new 
ground,  he  established  a  fort  between  Velasco  and  Matagorda ;  but  it  was  soon 
after  destroyed,  and  De  La  Salle's  premature  death,  at  the  hands  of  his  quarrel- 
some and  cowardly  associates,  greatly  retarded  the  progress  of  French  discovery. 
But  the  expedition,  and  those  which  followed  it,  caused  great  alarm,  and  as  much 
indignation  as  alarm,  at  the  Court  of  Spain.  A  century  and  a-half  was  yet  to 
elapse  ere  her  feebleness  should  compel  Spain  to  abandon  a  conquest  whose 
advantages  she  had  so  abused ;  ere  she  should  see  herself  driven  to  give  up  the 
immense  territory  which  she  had  held  so  long. 

Meanwhile  De  La  Salle's  expedition  caused  new  activity  in  Spain ;  and  in 
1691,  a  governor  "of  the  States  of  Coahuila  and  Texas"  was  appointed,  and 
with  a  handful  of  soldiers  and  friars  went  out  to  establish  missions  and  military 
posts.  Colonies  were  planted  on  the  Red  river,  on  the  Neches,  and  along  the 
banks  of  the  Guadalupe ;  but  in  a  few  years  they  died  out.  Presently  other 
efforts  were  made — the  Spaniards  meantime  keeping  up  a  sharp  warfare  with  the 
Indians,  the  mission  of  San  Juan  Bautista,  on  the  right  bank  of  the  Rio  Grande, 
three  miles  from  the  river,  being  created  a  presidio  or  garrison,  and  the  "old  San 
Antonio  road  "  between  Texas  and  Mexico  running  directly  by  it. 

Meantime  the  French  were  vigorously  pushing  expeditions  forward  from  the 
settlements  along  the  Louisiana  coast ;  and  so  very  much  in  earnest  seemed  the 
movements  of  Crozat,  the  merchant  prince,  to  whom  Louis  XIV.  had  ceded 
Louisiana,  that  the  Viceroy  of  Mexico  began  anew  measures  for  establishing 
missions  and  garrisons  throughout  Texas.  And  so  it  happened  that  in  17 15, 
after  a  mission  had  been  established  among  the  Adaes  Indians,  and  another,  the 
"  Dolores,"  west  of  the  Sabine  river,  the  fort  and  mission  of  San  Antonio  de 
Valero  was  located  on  the  right  bank  of  the  San  Pedro  river,  about  three-fourths 
of  a  mile  from  the  site  of  the  present  Catholic  Cathedral  in  San  Antonio  of  to-day. 


I50  THE     FOUNDING     OF     THE     TOWN THE     ALAMO     MISSION. 

From  this  year  (171 5)  may  be  said  to  date  the  decisive  occupancy  of  Texas 
by  Spain,  as  opposed  to  France;  she  drove  out  the  French  wherever  found, 
opposed  their  advances,  and  finally  succeeded  in  definitely  planting  fortified 
missions  at  the  principal  important  points.  San  Antonio  was  then  known  as  a 
garrison,  and  was  usually  spoken  of  as  the  Presidio  of  Bexar.  Indeed,  to  this 
day  the  elder  Mexicans  living  in  the  surrounding  country  speak  of  going  al 
presidio  (to  the  garrison)  whenever  they  contemplate  a  visit  to  San  Antonio. 
Texas  was  then  known  as  the  "  New  Phillippines ;"  and  San  Antonio,  with  its 
five  missions,  was  one  of  the  four  garrisons  by  which  it  was  protected. 

The  Marquis  of  Casa  Fuerte  had  long  believed  that  this  post  would  be  a  good 
site  for  a  town,  and,  having  asked  the  Spanish  Government  to  send  emigrants 
there,  "  thirteen  families  and  two  bachelors "  (say  the  ancient  town  records) 
arrived  from  the  Canary  Islands,  and  settled  on  the  east  side  of  the  San  Antonio 
river,  founding  a  town  which  they  called  San  Fernando.  To  them  came  sturdy 
Tlascalans  from  Mexico,  and  the  colonists  built  a  stout  little  hamlet  around  th» 
great  square  which  to-day  is  known  as  the  "  Plaza  of  the  Constitution,"  or  the 
main  square  in  San  Antonio.  The  town  was  called  San  Fernando,  in  honor  of 
Ferdinand,  the  then  king  of  Spain.  It  was  rough  work  to  be  a  colonist  in  those 
days,  and  the  Spaniards,  friars,  soldiers  and  all,  were  very  glad  to  get  into  the 
great  square  at  night,  close  the  entrance  with  green  hides,  set  their  sentinels  on 
the  roofs  of  the  flat  houses,  and,  trembling  lest  the  sound  of  the  war-whoop  of 
the  terrible  Apaches  and  Comanches  should  startle  their  slumbers,  catch  a  little 
repose.  These  Apaches  and  Comanches  overran  in  those  days  the  country 
between  San  Antonio  and  Santa  Fe,  and  would  swoop  down  upon  the  infant 
settlement  from  their  stronghold  in  the  pass  of  Bandera.  They  swarmed  in  the 
Guadalupe  mountains,  where  even  now  they  come  in  the  full  of  the  moon,  search- 
ing for  horses,  as  their  ancestors  did. 

In  due  time,  there  was  a  town  on  either  side  of  the  San  Antonio  river,  each 
with  its  mission  and  attendant  garrison.  Around  the  mission  of  the  "Alamo" 
had  clustered  a  little  garrison  and  village.  This  mission  church,  whose  history  is 
so  romantic,  was  first  founded  in  1703,  in  the  Rio  Grande  valley,  by  Franciscans 
from  Queretaro,  under  the  invocation  of  San  Francisco  de  Solano ;  but,  water 
being  scarce,  was  moved  back  and  forth  until  1718,  when, 

"  Borne,  like  Loretto's  chapel,  thro'  the  air," 

it  migrated  to  the  west  bank  of  the  San  Pedro  river,  and  remained  in  that  vicinity 
until,  in  1744,  it  was  removed  to  the  high  plateau  on  the  east  side  of  the  San 
Antonio,  and  the  foundations  of  the  Church  of  the  Alamo  were  laid  on  the  very 
ground  where,  ninety  years  after,  Travis  and  his  braves  fell  as  only  heroes  fall. 

The  mission  was  known,  until  1783,  as  San  Antonio  de  Valero,  in  honor  of 
the  Marquis  of  Valero,  the  then  Viceroy  of  "New  Spain."  The  town  below  the 
river  retained  its  name  of  San  Antonio  de  Bexar. 

The  missions  built  up  around  San  Antonio  were  named  respectively  La 
Purissima  Concepcion  de  Acuna,  San  Juan  Campitran,  San  Francisco  de  Assissis, 
and  San  Jose.    The  Franciscans,  completely  estranged  from  all  the  ordinary  cares 


THE      FRANCISCANS THE      MISSIONS      ESTABLISHED. 


151 


and  passions  of  the  world  by  the  vows  of  their  order,  gave  themselves  heartily  to 
their  work,  and  vigorously  employed  the  soldiers  allotted  them  by  the  Govern- 
ment in  catching  Indians,  whom  they  undertook  to  civilize.  The  missions  were 
fortified  convent- churches,  built  in  massive  and  enduring  form,  and  surrounded 
by  high  walls,  so  thick  and  strong  that  they  could  resist  all  Indian  attacks. 
Within  these  walls  the  converted  Indians  and  the  missionaries  and  soldiers 
gathered  whenever  a  sentinel  gave  the  alarm  ;  and  the  brawny  friars  joined  with 
the  men-at-arms  in  fiercely  defending  the  stations  where  the  cross  had  been 
planted.  The  Indians  who  were  induced  to  settle  in  the  vicinity  of  the  Francis- 
cans, and  submit  to  the  religious  and  industrial  training  which  the  friars  had 
prepared  for  them,  were  rarely  guilty  of  treachery,  and  submitted  to  all  the 
whippings  which  Mother  Church  thought  good  for  them.  Barefooted,  and  clad 
in  coarse  woolen  robes,  with  the  penitential  scourge  about  their  waists,  the  priests 
wandered  among  the  Indians  at  the  missions,  learned  their  language,  and  enforced 
chastity,  temperance  and  obedience.  Inside  the  square  which  the  mission  build- 
ings formed  were  the  dwellings  allotted  both  the  soldiers  and  the  Indians — the 
savages  chafing  under  this  restraint,  although  they  could  not  doubt  the  motives 
of  the  good  fathers  in  restraining  them.  But  they  toiled  well  in  the  fields, 
went  meekly  to  catechism,  and  were  locked  up  at  night,  lest  they  should  be  led 
into  temptation.  Whenever  the  converts  rebelled,  there  were  soldiers  enough  at 
hand  to  subdue  them ;  and  the  commander  of  the  church  garrison  was  a  kind 
of  absolute  potentate,  who  made  any  and  every  disposition  he  pleased  of  a  con- 
vert's life  and  property. 

In  1729,  the  right  reverend  fathers  forming  the  college  of  Santa  Cruz  of 
Queretaro,  were  authorized  to  found  three  missions  on  the  river  San  Marcos ; 
and,  in  1730,  a  superior  order  from  the  Marquis  of  Casa  Fuerte  authorized  the 
foundation  of  these  missions  upon  the  river  San  Antonio,  under  certain  conditions 
as  to  their  distance  from  the  San  Antonio  garrison.  The  result  was  that  before 
1780,    four    superb    mission 


edifices  had  been  reared,  at 
short  distances  from  each 
other,  and  not  far  from  the 
beautiful  San  Antonio  river. 
On  the  5th  of  March,  1731, 
the  foundations  of  La  Puris- 
sima  Concepcion  de  Actina 
were  laid,  and,  after  many 
vicissitudes  and  escapes  from 
imminent  destruction,  it  was 
completed  in  1752.  For 
twenty-one  years  Indians  and 
friars  had  toiled  upon  one  of 
the  noblest  churches  ever 
erected  by  Catholics  in  Amer- 
ica.    To-day  it  is  a  ruin,  de- 


The  old  Concepcion  Mission  near  San  Antonio  —  Texas. 


152  A     VISIT     TO     THE     CONCEPCION      MISSION. 

serted  save  by  an  humble  German  family,  who  exhibit  the  time-honored  walls 
to  visitors,  and  till  the  lands  in  the  vicinity.  The  San  jose  mission,  in  all 
respects  the  finest,  was  completed  in  177 1  ;  that  of  San  Juan  in  1746;  and 
the   "Espada"    in   1780. 

As  the  communities  clustered  about  these  missions  grew,  so  grew  San 
Antonio ;  as  they  suffered,  so  it  suffered  in  protecting  them.  The  same  Indians 
who  cantered  up  to  the  town-gates  did  not  fail  to  offer  some  menace  to  the  mis- 
sions before  returning  to  their  mountain  fastnesses.  In  1758,  they  went  farther, 
for  they  assaulted  the  mission  which  had  been  established  at  San  Saba.  Pastors 
and  their  flocks,  as  well  as  the  guardian  soldiery,  were  sacrificed.  Swarms  of  the 
savages  surrounded  the  mission,  and  the  wonderfully  rich  silver  mines  which  had 
been  developed  near  it,  and  not  a  Spaniard  was  left  alive  to  bear  the  news  of  the 
dreadful  massacre  to  his  trembling  comrades  at  the  other  missions.  Some  day 
the  San  Saba  mines  will  be  re-opened ;  but  their  exact  location  has  been  long 
lost  to  the  knowledge  of  Europeans  or  Mexicans,  and  no  Indian  will  point  the 
way  to  them. 

It  was  sunset,  on  a  beautiful  April  evening,  when  I  first  climbed  to  the  roof 
of  the  Concepcion  mission.  As  the  day  had  been  heated  and  dusty  in  town,  I 
was  glad,  toward  evening,  to  steal  away  down  the  lovely  road ;  past  the  dense 
groves  and  perfumed  thickets,  along  the  route  which  wound  among  trees  and 
flowers,  and  fertile  fields  watered  by  long  canals ;  past  quiet  cool  yards,  in  whose 
shaded  seclusion  I  could  catch  glimpses  of  charming  cottages  and  farm-houses, 
where  rosy  Germans  or  lean  Americans  sat  literally  under  their  own  "  vine  and 
fig-tree. " 

The  carriage  rolled  suddenly  through  a  ford  in  the  deep,  swift  stream,  came 
out  upon  a  stretch  of  open  field,  and  at  a  distance  I  saw,  peering  above  some 
graceful  trees,  the  twin  towers  of  Concepcion— saw  them  with  a  thrill  of  joy  at 
their  beauty  and  grandeur,  just  as  hundreds  of  weary  travelers  across  the  great 
plains  had  doubtless  seen  them  a  century  ago.  In  those  days  they  were  a 
welcome  sight,  for  they  guaranteed  comparative  security  in  a  land  where  nothing 
was  absolutely  certain,  save  death.  Approaching,  I  could  see  that  the  towers 
arose  from  a  massive  church  of  grayish  stone,  once  highly  ornate  and  rich  in 
sculpture  and  carving,  but  now  much  dilapidated.  The  portal  was  "decayed ;  the 
carvings  and  decorations  were  obscure;  a  Spanish  inscription  told  of  the  founding 
of  the  mission.  A  group  of  awe-struck  girls  lingered  about  the  door -way  as 
an  old  man  rehearsed  some  legend  of  the  place. 

The  edifice  bore  here  and  there  hints  of  the  Moorish  spirit,  the  tendency  to 
the  arch  and  vault  which  one  sees  so  much  in  Spanish  architecture.  The  great 
dome,  sprung  lightly  over  the  main  hall  of  the  church,  was  a  marvel  of  precision 
and  beauty.  In  front,  jutting  out  at  the  right  hand,  a  long  wall  now  fallen  into 
decay  showed  the  nature  of  the  mission's  original  defenses.  This  wall  was  of 
enormous  thickness,  and  the  half-ruined  dwellings  in  its  sides  are  still  visible. 

As  I  wandered  about  the  venerable  structure,  the  gray  walls  were  bathed  in 
the  golden  light  of  the  fervid  Southern  sunset ;  numberless  doves  hovered  in  and 
out  of  the  grand  towers;  lizards  crawled  at  the  walls'  base;  countless  thousands 


A      VISION      OF     THE      PAST ON     THE     TOWERS.  I  53 

of  grasshoppers  flashing  in  the  air,  nestled  on  the  mission's  sides ;  the  stone  cross 
between  the  twin  towers  stood  up  black  against  the  sky.  Curious  parapets  along 
the  roof,  contrived  at  once  for  ornament  and  shelter,  showed  loop-holes  for  mus- 
kets. There  were  mysterious  entrances  in  the  rear,  and  the  stone  threw  a  dark 
shadow  upon  the  short,  sparse,  sun-dried  grass.  I  tried  to  call  up  the  mission 
fort  as  it  was  a  century  ago,  surrounded  with  smiling  fields,  cultivated  by  patient 
Indians ;  with  soldiers  at  their  posts,  diligently  guarding  the  approaches ;  with 
the  old  friars  in  their  coarse  robes,  building  and  teaching,  and  praying  and 
scourging  themselves  and  the  Indians.  I  pictured  to  myself  a  cavalcade  arriving 
at  sunset  from  a  weary  journey;  men-at-arms,  and  gayly-costumed  cavaliers 
entering  the  gateway;  the  clatter  of  swords  and  the  click  of  musket-locks;  the 
echoes  of  the  evening  hymn  from  the  resounding  vault  of  the  cathedral; — :but 
the  Present,  in  the  shape  of  a  rail-fence  and  four  excitable  dogs  anxiously 
peering  at  me  from  behind  it,  would  obtrude  itself,  so  I  gave  meditation  the 
good-by,  and  asked  of  the  family  the  way  to  the  roof. 

The  barefooted  German  maiden,  naive  and  bashful,  seemed  strangely  out  of 
place  in  the  shadows  of  the  mission.  I  wandered  through  the  kitchen,  an  old 
nook  in  the  wall,  and  venturing  behind  the  heels  of  half  a  dozen  mules  stabled  in 
a  niche  of  the  sanctuary,  mounted  a  crazy  ladder  leading  to  the  belfry  window. 

Getting  in  at  the  huge  opening,  I  startled  the  doves,  who  flew  angrily  away, 
and  then  clinging  to  the  wall  on  one  side,  I  climbed  still  another  flight  of  stone 
steps,  and  emerged  on  the  roof.  A  giant  piece  of  masonry,  my  masters  of  to- 
day !  You  can  certainly  do  but  little  better  than  did  the  poor  friars  and  Indians 
a  century  ago.  Being  built  of  the  soft  stone  of  the  country,  the  ruin  has  crum- 
bled in  many  places;  but  it  looks  as  if  it  might  still  last  for  a  century.  For 
miles  around,  the  country  is  naked,  save  for  its  straggling  growth  of  mesquite, 
of  cactus,  of  chaparral;  the  forest  has  never  reasserted  itself  since  the  fathers 
cultivated  the  fields ;  and  one  can  very  readily  trace  the  ancient  limits. 

The  grant  of  the  mission  of  Concepcion  was  about  the  first  by  the  Spanish 
Government  in  Texas  of  which  there  is  any  record.  In  March  of  1731  the 
captain  commanding  at  San  Antonio  went  to  the  newly  allotted  mission  grounds, 
kindly  greeted  the  Indians  who  had  decided  to  settle  there,  and  caused  the  chief 
of  the  tribe  to  go  about  over  the  ceded  lands,  to  pull  up  weeds,  turn  over  stones, 
and  go  through  all  the  traditional  ceremonials  of  possession.  The  same  formali- 
ties were  observed  in  founding  all  the  missions  near  San  Antonio ;  the  transfer  of 
the  lands  being  made  to  the  Indians,  because  the  Franciscans,  on  account  of  their 
vows,  could  hold  no  worldly  estate. 

We  Americans  of  the  present  should  lean  rather  kindly  toward  these  old 
Franciscans,  for  they  were  largely  instrumental  in  the  work  of  freeing  Texas 
from  the  yoke  of  Spanish  and  Mexican  tyranny.  As  priests,  they  were  too 
human  and  sympathetic  to  enjoy  or  sympathize  with  the  brutal  policy  of  Spain ; 
and  as  sensible  men,  they  had  Democratic  leanings,  doubtless  enhanced  by  the 
Spartan  plainness  in  which  they  lived. 

The  various  internal  troubles  undergone  by  Spain  early  in  this  century  had 
only  served  to  make  her  more  arrogant  toward  her  colonies,  and  a  large  party  in 


154  FIGHTS      WITH      THE      SPANIARDS THE      SAN      JOSE      MISSION. 

them  was  anxious  to  revolt.  At  this  time  there  were  few  Americans  in  the  ter- 
ritory. Now  and  then  the  agents  of  Wilkinson  and  Burr  ran  through  it, 
endeavoring  to  perfect  designs  for  their  new  South-western  Empire ;  but,  besides 
these  ambitious  schemers,  only  desperadoes  from  the  United  States  entered 
Texas. 

In  1 813,  however,  Augustus  W.  Magee,  a  lieutenant  in  the  American  army, 
undertook,  in  conjunction  with  a  Mexican  revolutionist,  to  conquer  Texas  to  the 
Rio  Grande,  with  a  view  to  annexing  it  to  America  or  Mexico,  as  circumstances 
should  dictate.  He  resigned  his  commission  and  plunged  headlong  into  the 
invasion,  bringing  to  it  many  men  and  much  courage,  and  fighting  a  good  fight 
at  Nacogdoches ;  but,  finally  contemplating  a  retreat,  and  unable  to  carry  his  men 
with  him  in  his  plans,  he  is  generally  believed  to  have  ended  his  life  by  his  own 
hands. 

A  short  time  thereafter,  the  invading  Americans  and  the  revolting 
Mexicans  arrived  before  San  Antonio,  and  attacked  the  city  at  once.  General 
Salcedo,  the  Spaniard  commanding,  valiantly  defended  it ;  but  the  Americans  and 
Mexicans  won,  and  as  the  Indians  from  the  missions  had  joined  in,  but  few 
prisoners  were  taken,  more  than  1,000  Spaniards  being  killed  and  wounded. 
Salcedo  and  a  number  of  noted  Spanish  officials  were  brutally  murdered. 

A  few  days  later,  the  Americans  and  Mexicans  were  attacked  by  other 
Spanish  forces,  whom  they  repulsed  with  great  slaughter.  But  a  third  Spanish 
force  was  sent  to  San  Antonio,  and  4,000  men  gave  battle  to  850  Americans  and 
twice  as  many  Mexicans,  composing  the  "  Republican  Army  of  the  North,"  near 
the  Medina  river.  The  Spaniards  were  victorious,  and  all  of  the  Americans  but 
ninety- three  were  massacred.  A  large  number  of  the  Americans  were  shot  on 
the  San  Antonio  road,  their  cruel  captors  seating  them  by  tens  on  timbers  placed 
over  newly- dug  graves,  and  thus  despatching  them.  This  terrible  massacre  was 
known  as  the  "battle  of  the  Medina."  Then  the  brave  old  town  of  San  Antonio 
suffered  the  vengeance  of  the  Spanish  authorities.  Seven  hundred  of  its  best 
citizens  were  imprisoned,  and  500  of  the  wives  and  daughters  of  the  patriots 
were  thrown  into  filthy  dungeons. 

From  that  time  forth  the  history  of  San  Antonio  was  one  of  blood  and 
battle,  of  siege  and  slaughter.  The  Americans,  who,  in  a  reckless  manner,  had 
given  their  blood  for  Texan  freedom,  were  henceforth  to  act  from  the  simpler 
motive  of  self-defense. 

The  vast  pile  of  ruins  known  as  the  San  Jose  Mission  stands  in  the  midst  of 
the  plain  about  four  miles  westward  from  San  Antonio.  Mute,  mighty  and  pass- 
ing beautiful,  it  is  rapidly  decaying. 

The  Catholic  church  in  Texas,  to  whom  the  missions  and  the  mission  lands 
now  belong,  is  too  poor  to  attempt  the  restoration  of  this  superb  edifice  which 
one  of  the  most  famous  of  Parisian  architects,  in  a  recent  tour  through  this 
country,  pronounced  the  finest  piece  of  architecture  in  the  United  States.  San 
Jose  has  more  claims  to  consideration  than  have  the  other  missions,  as  the  king 
of  Spain  sent  an  architect  of  rare  ability  to  superintend  its  erection.  This 
architect,  Huizar,  finally  settled  in  Texas,  where  his  descendants  still  live. 


THE     MEXICAN     FAMILY     AT     THE     SAN     JOSE      MISSION. 


155 


It  is  impossible  to  paint  in  words  the  grand  effect  of  this  imposing  yellowish- 
gray  structure,  with  its  belfry,  its  long  ranges  of  walls  with  vaulted  archways,  its 
rich  and  quaintly  carved  windows,  its  winding  stairways,  its  shaded  aisles,  rearing 
itself  from  the  parched  lands.     As  our  party  entered  the  rear  archways  an  old, 

sun-dried  Mexican  approached,  and  in  a 
weak  voice  invited  us  to  enter  the  church. 
The  old  man  and  his  bronzed  wife  had 
placed  their  household  goods  in  the  in- 
terior of  the  edifice ;  and  in  the  outer 
porch  dried  beef  was  hung  over  the 
images  of  the  saints.  An  umbrella  and 
candlestick  graced  the  christening  font. 
Lighting  a  corn-shuck  cigarette,  the  old 
man  lay  down  on  one  of  the  beds  with  a 
moan,  for  he  was  a  confirmed  invalid. 
We  climbed  to  the  tower,  but  speedily 
came  down  again,  as  the  great  dome  fell 
in  last  year,  and  the  roof  is  no  longer 
considered  safe. 

Returning  to  the  shade,  the  Mexican 
An  old  window  in  the  San  jose  Mission.  woman,  clad  in  a  single  coarse  garment, 

her  hair  falling  not  ungracefully  about  a  face  which,  although  she  must  have  been 
fifty,  seemed  still  young,  served  us  with  water  in  a  gourd,  and  then  seated 
herself  on  the  ground  with  the  hens  affectionately  picking  about  her.  Was  she 
born  at  the  mission  ?  we  asked.  No,  senor ;  but  in  San  Fernando.  And  where 
had  she  spent  her  youth  ?  In  Piedras  Negras,  senor.  And  did  she  not  fear  the 
roof  of  the  old  mission  might  some  day  fall  and  crush  her  ?  Who  knows,  senor, 
she  answered,  ambiguously  ;  giving  that  vague  shake 
of  the  head  by  which  both  Spaniards  and  Mexicans 
so  accurately  express  profound  unconcern.  In  the 
shade  of  some  of  the  great  walls  were  little  stone 
cabins,  in  which  lived  other  Mexican  families. 
Bronzed  children  were  running  about  in  the  sun,  and 
bronzed  fathers  were  working  lazily  in  the  field.  In 
the  distance,  in  any  direction — chaparral, — mesquite, 
— cactus, — short,  burned  grass,  and  the  same  pros- 
pect all  the  way  to  the  Rio  Grande. 

A  sun-swept,  sun  -  burnished  land;  a  land  of 
mirages,  and  long,  wearying  distances  without  water ; 
a  land  of  mysterious  clumps  of  foliage,  inviting  to 
ambush ;  where  soldiers  are  always  chasing  maraud- 
ing savages  whom  they  rarely  catch,  and  where  the 
Mexican  and  the  Indian  together  hunt  the  cattle  of 
the  "  Gringo ;"  where  little  towns  cluster  trustingly  around  rough  fortresses ; 
where  the   lonely  "ranch"  is  defended   by  the   brave    settler  with   his  "Win- 


'An  umbrella  and  candlestick  graced 
the  christening  font." 


i56 


SAN     JUAN — THE     ESPADA CONSIDERANT'S     HOUSE. 


Chester;"  where  millions  of  cattle  and  thousands  of  horses  and  sheep  roam 
fancy  free  from  year  to  year,  their  owners  only  now  and  then  riding  in  among 
them  to  secure  the  increase ; — that  is  the  beyond. 

The  San  Juan  mission,  a  little  beyond  the  San  Antonio  river,  some  three  or 
four  miles  farther  down,  like  the  Espada,  which  stands  upon  the  bend  in  the 
river  still  below,  is  but  a  ruin.  In  its  day  it  was  very  large,  and  many  families 
lived  within  its  bounds.  Now  there  is  little  to  be  seen,  except  a  small  chapel 
and  the  ruins  of  the  huge  walls.  A  few  families  live  among  the  debris,  and 
there  is  even  a  "  San  Juan  Mission  Store." 

The  scene  about  the  humble  abodes  of  the  Mexicans,  residing  in  or  near 
these  missions,  is  very  uniform.  There  is  a  rude  water-cart  near  the  door;  a  few 
pigs  run  about  the  premises,  and  a  hairless  Mexican  dog  watches  them ;  two  or 
three  men,  squatted  on  their  haunches,  sit  blinking  in  the  sun.  No  one  ever 
seems  to  do  any  work;  though  the  Mexicans  about  San  Antonio  have  a  good 
reputation  as  laborers. 


"The  comfortable  country-house  so  long' occupied  by  Victor  Considerant.'' 


It  was  at  the  Concepcion  mission  that  the  patriot  army  of  Texas  assembled  in 
1835,  after  the  capture  of  Goliad ;  and  it  was  along  the  river  bottom  and  in  the 
timber  by  the  river,  -that  a  battle  was  fought  in  which  the  Mexicans  received 
severe  treatment. 

On  the  river  road  from  San  Antonio  to  Concepcion  stands  the  comfortable 
country-house  so  long  occupied  by  Victor  Considerant,  the  French  free-thinker 
and  socialist.  Considerant,  after  his  ineffectual  attempt  to  found  a  community 
of  the  Fourier  type  in  Texas,  lived  tranquilly  with  his  family  near  the  old 
mission  for  many  years,  going  to  San  Antonio  now  and  then  for  society,  and 
occupying  his  leisure  with  literary  work.  A  strange  man,  strongly  fixed  in  his 
beliefs  and  prejudices,  he  was  not  thoroughly  understood,  though  universally 
respected  by  the  Texans  who  met  him. 


XV. 


THE     PEARL     OF     THE     SOUTH-WEST, 


SAN  Antonio  is  watered  by  two  beautiful  streams,  the  San  Antonio  and  the 
San  Pedro,  the  former  running  directly  through  the   town's  centre.      Its 
bluish  current  flows  in  a  narrow  but 


picturesque  channel  between  bold  and 
rugged  banks  in  some  places,  and 
sloping  borders  in  others,  and  is  every- 
where overhung  with  delicate  group- 
ings of  foliage.  It  passes  under  bridges, 
by  arbors  and  bath-houses ;  by  flights 
of  stone  steps  leading  up  into  cool,  cozy 
houses,  as  the  stairways  lead  from 
Venetian  canals;  past  little  lawns, 
where  the  San  Antonian  loafs  at  his 
ease  at  midday;  and  on  through  sweet 
fields,  full  of  a  wealth  of  blossoms. 
Nowhere,  however,  is  it  so  supremely 
beautiful  as  at  its  source,  on  the  high 
plateau  at  the  foot  of  the  Guadalupe 
range,  where  it  breaks  out  from  a  fine 
spring,  and  shapes  itself  at  once  into  a 
beautiful  stream.  .Around  the  natural 
park   of  several  hundred  acres  which 


The  San  Antonio  River —  "Its  bluish  current  flows  in  a 
narrow  but  picturesque  channel." 


lies  along  the  base  of  the  mountains,  Mr.  Brackenridge,  the  banker,  who  pur- 
chased   the  estate,  has  thrown  a  protecting  wall    enclosing   a   park   which   an 

English  duke  might  covet.  The 
stream  is  a  delicious  poem  written 
in  water  on  the  loveliest  of  river- 
beds, from  which  mosses,  ferns, 
dreamiest  green  and  faintest  crimson, 
rich  opalescent  and  strong  golden 
hues,  peep  out.  Every  few  rods  there 
is  a  waterscape  in  miniature — an 
apotheosis  of  color.  Noble  pecans, 
grand  oaks,  lofty  ashes,  shade  the 
stream,  which  flows  down  toward  a 
quarry  a  little  above  the  town,  where 

The  Source  of  the  San  Antonio  River.  it   again    forms    a   picture    Such   as    Only 


i58 


SAN     PEDRO      SPRINGS. 


the  Marne  at  St.  Maur,  or  the  Seine  at  Marly  can  rival.  To  the  people  of  San 
Antonio  it  is  a  perpetual  delight,  a  constant  treasure,  of  which  they  speak  almost 
reverently.  The  San  Pedro  is  commonly  known  as  a  creek,  but  has  many  a 
beautiful  nook  along  its  banks ;  and  in  one  of  them,  called  "  San  Pedro  Springs," 

the  Germans  have  estab- 
lished their  beer  gardens. 
There,  in  the  long  Sun- 
day afternoons,  hundreds 
of  families  are  gathered, 
drinking  beer,  listening  to 
music  and  singing,  play- 
ing with  the  fawns,  or 
gazing  into  the  beer  gar- 
den and  the  den  of  the 
Mexican  panther.  There, 
too,  the  Turnverein  takes 
its  exercise ;  and  in  a  long 
hall,  dozens  of  children 
waltz,  under  the  direction 
of  a  gray-haired  old-  pro- 
fessor, while  two  specta- 
cled masters  of  the  violin 

San  Pedro  Springs  —  "The  Germans  have  established  their  beer  gardens."  make  music.        This    is   the 

Sunday  rendezvous  of  great  numbers  of  the  citizens  of  San  Antonio,  Germans 
and  Americans,  and  is  as  merry,  as  free  from  vulgarity  or  quarreling,  as  any  beer 
garden  in  Dresden.  The  German  element  has  been  of  incalculable  value  to 
Western  Texas,  and  especially  to  San  Antonio.      It  has  aided  much  in  building 


'Every  few  rods  there  is  a  waterscape  in  miniature."     [Page  157.] 


THE      GERMANS FREE      SPEECH      IN     TEXAS. 


159 


up  the  material  interests  of  the  whole  section ;  has  very  largely  increased  the 
trade  of  the  city ;  has  brought  with  it  conservatism  and  good  sense  in  manners, 
so  that  even  a  frontier  town,  eighty  miles  from  any  railroad,  and  not  more  than 
thirty  miles  from  Indians, 
has  all  the  grace  and  deco- 
rum of  older  societies.  The 
German  was  a  good  element, 
too,  when  the  trying  issues 
of  the  last  war  came ;  and 
was  unwavering  in  its  loy- 
alty. The  Germans  suffered 
much,  and  many  were  driven 
out,  losing  property  and 
money;  hundreds  were 
slaughtered  in  trying  to  es- 
cape to  Mexico,  or  into  the 
North-west;  there  were 
shameful  massacres ;  but 
they  were  not  to  be  fright- 
ened, and  they  held  to  their 
opinions,  although  often 
obliged  to  conceal  them. 
Texas  is  a  changed  place 
indeed  to  the  people  who 
were  afraid  to  express  their 
views  before  the  war.  As  a 
gentleman  in  San  Antonio 
said  to  me,  "  It  was  like  living  in  an  asylum  where  every  one  was  crazy  on  one 
especial  subject;  you  never  knew  when  dangerous  paroxysms  were  about  to 
begin."     The  Texas  of  twelve  years  ago,  when  it  was  dangerous  for  a  man  to 

be  seen  reading  the 
New  York  Tribune,  and 
critically  perilous  for 
him  to  be  civil  to  a 
slave,  has  passed  away, 
and  the  Texans  them- 
selves are  glad  that 
they  have  awakened 
from  their  dream  of 
patriarchal  aristocracy, 
which  placed  such  a 
check  upon  the  devel- 
opment of  the  State. 
The  Germans  have  set- 
tled   several    thriving 


~^m 


"The  river  passes  under  bridges,  by  arbors  and  bath-houses."     [Page  157.] 


The  Ursuline  Convent — San  Antonio.     [Page  161.] 


II 


i6o 


TRADE BANKS RAILROADS THE  PLAZAS. 


places  west  of  San  Antonio,  the  most  noted  of  which  is  Fredericksburg. 
German  and  Jewish  names  are  over  the  doors  of  certainly  more  than  half  the 
business  houses  in  San  Antonio ;  and  German  or  Hebrew  talent  conducts  many- 
vast  establishments  which  have  trade  with  the  surrounding  country,  or  with 
Mexico. 

San  Antonio  has  so  long  been  a  depot  for  military  supplies  for  all  the  forts  on 
the  south-western  frontier,  and  for  the  Mexican  States  this  side  of  the  Sierra 
Madre,  that  some  of  the  merchants  are  not  in  favor  of  the  advent  of  railroads, 
fearing  that  with  them  trade  will  move  beyond  the  venerable  city,  and  forgetting 
that  even  in  that  event  there  will  be  ample  compensating  advantages.  The 
sooner  Western  Texas  has  railroads,  the  sooner  will  the  Indian  and  Mexican 
difficulties  be  settled ;  the  sooner  will  all  the  available  rich  lands  be  taken  up. 

Even     now    the    business 

done  by  means  of  the 
slow  wagon  trains,  which 
can  at  best  only  make 
twenty  miles  per  day,  is 
enormous,  amounting  to 
many  millions  yearly. 
What  will  it  be  when  rail- 
roads penetrate  to  the  now 
untamed  frontiers?  Many 
of  the  appliances  of  civ- 
ilization are  fast  reaching 
Western  Texas  for  the  first 
time.  San  Antonio  now 
has  four  prosperous  banks, 
— she  had  none  before  the 
war, — gas-lights,  two  daily 
papers,  and  a  weekly  for 
the  Germans;  how  can  she 
avoid  railroads  ? 

Three  lines  are  at  present  pointed  directly  at  the  antique  city ;  the  Galveston, 
Harrisburg  and  San  Antonio  railroad,  nearly  completed;  the  Gulf,  Western 
Texas  and  Pacific  railroad,  which  at  present  extends  from  Indianola  to  Victoria, 
and  has  been  graded  to  Cuero,  thirty  miles  beyond  Victoria ;  and  the  Interna- 
tional railroad,  which  contemplates  touching  both  Austin  and  San  Antonio, 
thus  opening  a  through  line  to  Longview,  in  Northern  Texas,  and  south-west- 
ward to  Mazatlan  on  the  Pacific,  with  a  branch  to  the  city  of  Mexico.  There  is 
not  much  probability  that  the  last  line  will  be  finished  to  San  Antonio,  at  least 
for  many  years. 

The  plazas,  or  public  squares  of  San  Antonio,  merit  special  attention.  The 
four  principal  ones  are  the  Alamo,  the  Constitution,  the  Military,  and  Travis. 
The  latter  is  a  handsome  grass- grown  common  surrounded  by  pretty  residences, 
some  of  them  fronting  upon  charming  lawns  and  gardens  ;  a  stone  church  is  to 


St  Mary's  Church — San  Antonio.      [Page  161.] 


SAN      FERNANDO      CHURCH "LAREDITO." 


161 


be  erected  there  by  the  Episcopalians.  The  Ursuline  Convent  and  St.  Mary's 
Church  are   among  the   noticeable   Catholic  edifices  of  the  town. 

The  old  church  of  San  Fernando  is  now  removed  from  the  "  Plaza  of  the 
Constitution,"  or  rather  is  enshrined  within  a  new  and  imposing  edifice,  built  of 

the  white  stone  of  __. . 

the  section.      The  , "        ^T—ipr 

Constitution  plaza 
is  the  original  gar- 
rison square  of  San 
Fernando,  and 
streets  lead  out 
from  it  into  the 
open  country,  the 
Military  plaza,  and 
the  main  part  of 
the    town.      The 

Military  plaza  is  surrounded  by  storehouses  and  shops,  and  is  always  filled 
with  wagon  teams  and  their  picturesque  and  ragged  drivers.  From  thence 
it  is  only  a  few  steps  to  one  of  the  Mexican  quarters  of  the  town,  sometimes 
called  "  Laredito."  There  the  life  of  the  eighteenth  century  still  prevails, 
without  taint  of  modernism.  Wandering  along  the  unpaved  street  in  the 
evening,  one  finds  the  doors  of  all  the  Mexican  cottages  open,  and  has  only 
to  enter  and  demand  supper  to  be  instantly  served ;  for  the  Mexican  has 
learned  to  turn  American  curiosity  about   his   cookery  to  account.      Entering 


A  Mexican  Hovel.        Page  162  ] 


The  Military  Plaza — San  Antonio. 


l62 


MEXICAN      SUPPER FLORES      STREET. 


one  of  these  hovels,  you  will  find  a  long,  rough  table  with  wooden  benches 
about  it ;  a  single  candlestick  dimly  sending  its  light  into  the  dark  recesses 
of  the  unceiled  roof;  a  hard  earth-floor,  in  which  the  fowls  are  busily  bestowing 
themselves  for  sleep ;  a  few  dishes  arranged  on  the  table,  and  glasses  and 
coffee-cups  beside  them.  The  fat,  tawny  Mexican  materfamilias  will  place 
before  you  various  savory  compounds,  swimming  in  fiery  pepper,  which  biteth 
like  a  serpent ;  and  the  tortilla,  a  smoking  hot  cake,  thin  as  a  shaving,  and 
about  as  eatable,  is  the  substitute  for  bread.  This  meal,  with  bitterest  of  coffee 
to  wash  it  down,  and  dulcet  Spanish  talked  by  your  neighbors  at  table  for  dessert, 
will  be  an  event  in  your  gastronomic  experience.  You  will  see  many  Americans 
scattered  along  at  the  tables  in  the  little  houses  in  Laredito ;  even  where 
I  went  there  was  a  large  party  of  the  curious,  ciceroned  by  one  of  the  oldest 
and  most  respected  of  San  Antonio's  citizens,  "Don  Juan"  Twohig,  the  wealthy 


'The  Mexicans  slowly  saw  and  carve  the  great  stones.' 


Irish  banker,  who  was  sixty-five  years  old  that  very  day,  but  rolled  tortillas  as 
heartily  as  when  a  sturdy  youth,  and  was  as  gay  as  when,  a  gallant  revolutionist, 
he  beguiled  the  hours  of  captivity  in  the  Castle  of  Perote,  where  the  cruel 
Mexicans  had  sent  him. 

The  residences  on  Flores  street  are  all  completely  embowered  in  shrubbery,  and 
many  of  them  are  intrinsically  fine.  There  are  few  wooden  structures  in  the  city. 
The  solid  architecture  of  previous  centuries  prevails.  Putting  up  a  house  is  a 
work  of  time ;  the  Mexicans  slowly  saw  and  carve  the  great  stones ;  but  the  work 
is  solid  when  completed,  and  fire-proof.  Most  of  the  houses  and  blocks  in  Com- 
merce and  other  principal  streets  are  two  stories  high — sometimes  three — and 
there  are  some  fine  shops — one  or  two  of  them  being  veritable  museums  of  traffic. 

It  is  from  these  shops  that  the  assortments  are  made  up  which  toil  across  the 
plains  to  the  garrisons  and  to  Mexico  ;   and  a  wagon-train,  loaded  with  a  "varied 


MEXICAN      HOUSES THE      ALAMO. 


163 


assortment,"  contains  almost  everything  known  in  trade.  Through  the  narrow 
streets  every  day  clatter  the  mule-teams,  their  tattered  and  dirty-clothed  negro 
drivers  shouting  frantically  at  them  as  they  drag  civilized  appliances  toward 
Mexico.  These  wagoners  lead  a  wild  life  of  almost  constant  danger  and  adven- 
ture, but  they  are  fascinated  with  it,  and  can  rarely  be  induced  to  give  it  up. 

The  Mexicans  monopolize  a  corner  of  the  town,  which  has  won  the  sobriquet 
of  "Chihuahua."     It  is  a  picturesque  collection  of  hovels,  built  of  logs,  stones, 


"The  elder  women  wash  clothes  by  the  brookside." 

and  dried  mud,  and  thatched  with  brush  or  straw.  Little  gardens  are  laid  out  in 
front  of  the  houses,  some  of  which  are  no  larger  than  a  sentry-box,  and  naked 
children  play  in  the  primitive  streets.  Young  girls,  bold-eyed  and  beautiful, 
gayly  dressed,  and  with  shawls  thrown  lightly  over  their  superb  heads,  saunter 
idly  about,  gossiping,  or  staring  saucily  at  strangers ;  the  elder  women  wash 
clothes  by  the  brookside.  The  men  seem  to  be  perpetually  waiting  for  some  one 
to  come  and  feed  them.  They  wander  about  in  the  most  purposeless  fashion, 
and  one  is  tempted  to  think  them  on  the  look-out  for  a  chance  to  rob  or  murder ; 
yet  they  are,  on  the  contrary,  quite  inoffensive.  "Chihuahua"  and  "Laredito" 
are  nooks  that  one  would  never  suspect  could  exist  on  American  soil.  But 
the  Mexican  is  hard-headed,  and  terribly  prejudiced ;  he  cannot  be  made  to 
see  that  his  slow,  primitive  ways,  his  filth  and  lack  of  comfort,  are  not  better 
than  the  frugal  decency  and  careful  home  management  of  the  Germans  and 
Americans  who  surround  him. 

The  Alamo  is  the  shrine  to  which  every  pilgrim  to  this  strange  corner  of 
America  must  do  utmost  reverence.  It  is  venerable  as  mission  church  and  fort- 
ress, and  was  so  baptized  in  blood  that  it  is  world-famous.  The  terse  inscription 
on  the  Alamo  monument,  in  the  porch  of  the  capitol  at  Austin,  "  Thermopyltz  had 
her  messenger  of  death;  the  Alamo  had  none  /"  indicates  the  reverence  in 
which  the  ruins  are  held  by  Texans.  There  is  now  but  little  left  of  the  original 
edifice.  The  portion  still  standing  is  used  as  a  Government  storehouse;  and 
the  place  where  Travis  and  his  immortals  fell,  which  should  be  the  site  of  a  fine 
monument,  is  a  station  for  the  mule  and  ox-teams  waiting  to  receive  stores. 


1 64 


THE   STRUGGLE   FOR  TEXAN   INDEPENDENCE. 


It  was  a  noteworthy  struggle  which  led  to  the  massacre  at  the  Alamo,  and 
thence  to  Texan  independence.  Moses  and  Stephen  F.  Austin,  father  and  son, 
struggled  through  a  dreary  period  of  colonization  from  1821  until  1836.  The 
father  died  before  he  had  succeeded  in  availing  himself,  to  any  extent,  of  the 
hesitating  permission  he  had  received  from  the  Spaniards  to  introduce  Americans 
into  Texas ;  but  his  son  took  that  permission  as  his  patrimony,  and  went  at  the 
work  with  a  will. 

Stephen  Austin  was  obliged  to  brave  a  thousand  dangers  in  founding  his  first 
colony  on  the  banks  of  the  Brazos ;  but  the  colony  grew,  and  acquired  a  steadiness 
and  prosperity,  even  while  the  adjacent  Mexican  States  were  undergoing  twenty 
revolutions.  The  time,  however,  came,  and  speedily,  when  the  Government  of 
Mexico  perceived  that  the  two  races  were  radically  antagonistic,  and  that  Amer- 
ican activity  would  soon  conquer  the  whole  territory,  unless  force  were  opposed  to 
it.  So,  with  the  usual  blindness  of  despotism,  Guerrero,  the  weak  and  despi- 
cable tyrant,  began  hostilities  against  the  Americans,  and  detachments  of  soldiers 
crept  in  upon  the  colonists,  occupying  various  posts,  under  one  pretext  or 
another,  until  the  colonists  saw  through  the  ruse,  and  openly  defied  the  crafty 
invaders. 

Guerrero  continued  provocative  measures  ;  freeing  slaves  throughout  Mexico, 
and  thus  violating  a  treaty  made  with  the  American  colonists  ;  and  at  last,  the 
Mexican  Congress  forbade  any  more  Americans  to  enter  Texas. 

Then  came  the  thunder-storm  !  The  colonists  sent  commissioners  to  com- 
plain to  the  Mexican  Government  of  their  ill-treatment.  These  commissioners 
were  imprisoned  and  abused,  and  the  colonists  flew  to  arms — took  the  citadel  of 
Anahuac — took  other  fortresses  and  held  them — released  their  commissioners — 
repudiated  Mexico  —  met  in  convention  at  San  Felipe,  in  1832,  and  drew  up  a 
constitution  under  which  they  desired  to  live.     Stephen  Austin  agreed  to  present 


Mexican  types  in  San  Antonio. 


THE      REVOLT      AT      SAN     JACINTO SIEGE      OF      THE      ALAMO. 


I65 


'The  remnant  of  the  old  fort  of  the  Alamo." 


it  to  the  parent  government  in  the  city  of  Mexico,  but  when  he  reached  that 
place  he  was  thrown  into  prison.  This  and  other  odious  tyrannies  of  Santa 
Anna,  the  new  ruler  and  liberator  of  Mexico,  opened  the  way  to  the  Alamo,  to 
San  Jacinto,  and  to  inde- 
pendence. It  was  a  bloody 
path,  but  bravely  trod ! 
There  were  giants  in  those 
days,  men  who  gave  their 
lives  cheerfully,  men  who 
held  death  in  contempt. 
Such  men  were  Austin, 
Houston,  Travis,  Fannin, 
and  Milam. 

The  final  struggle  be- 
tween Santa  Anna,  dictator 
of  Mexico,  and  the  Texan- 
American  army  began  in 
1834.  It  was  a  clever  pre- 
text which  brought  about  the  real  war.  The  Mexican  governor  of  Coahuila, 
the  province  allied  to  Texas,  had,  in  order  to  meet  his  expenses,  proposed  the 
sale  of  lands  in  Texas. 

Numerous  speculators  presented  themselves ;  but  they  were  all  Americans, 
and  when  this  became  known,  the  Mexican  Government  refused  to  ratify  the  gov- 
ernor's action.  The  governor  insisted ;  troops  were  sent  into  Coahuila  to  expel 
the  rebel  Legislature  which  had  voted  the  land  measure,  and  the  Texan- 
Americans  found  themselves,  as  well  as  their  neighbors,  in  danger  of  invasion. 
They  could  wait  no  longer;  they  raised  the  standard  of  revolt  on  the  plains  of 
San  Jacinto,  August  16,  1835  ;  and  as  soon  as  the  news  of  the  rebellion 
came  to  Mexican  ears,  General  Cos,  by  Santa  Anna's  orders,  sat  down 
before  San  Antonio,  the  rebellious  capital,  to  starve  it  into  submission.  There 
was  fighting  everywhere — at  Goliad,  at  Gonzales,  in  all  the  towns,  and 
around  them. 

General  Cos  took  San  Antonio ;  was  besieged  in  it ;  had  to  give  it  up  to 
brave  Ben  Milam  and  the  "three  hundred  men  who  were  ready  to  die;"  and,  a 
little  time  after,  the  people  of  Texas,  assembled  in  convention  at  Washington,  on 
the  Brazos  river,  enthusiastically  voted  the  declaration  of  the  absolute  indepen- 
dence of  Texas.  So  Santa  Anna,  with  three  army  corps,  began  the  third  siege 
of  San  Antonio. 

As  you  see  the  remnant  of  the  old  fort  of  the  Alamo  now,  its  battered  walls 
looming  up  without  picturesque  effect  against  the  brilliant  sky,  and  the  clouds  of 
dust  which  the  muleteers  and  their  teams  stir  up,  half  hiding  it — perhaps  it  does 
not  seem  to  you  like  a  grand  historic  memorial.  Indeed  it  is  not  so  grand  as  in 
its  old  days,  when,  as  a  church,  standing  proudly  under  the  shade  of  the  noble 
cottonwood  trees,  it  was  the  cynosure  of  every  eye.  It  has  fallen  much  into 
decay,  and  the  Government,  which  would  use  Washington's  tomb  for  a  store- 


l66  HOW      TRAVIS      AND     HIS      MEN      DIED. 

house,  rather  than  build  a  proper  one,  if  Mount  Vernon  were  a  military  depot, 
has  cumbered  it  with  boxes  and  barrels. 

But  you  must  picture  the  old  fort  as  it  was  on  Sunday,  the  6th  of  March, 
1836,  when  Texas  was  a  young  and  war- ridden  republic.  Santa  Anna,  with  an 
overwhelming  force  of  infantry,  had  hemmed  in  and  forced  to  retreat  into  the 
fort  a  little  band  of  one  hundred  and  forty  or  fifty  men,  commanded  by  Lieu- 
tenant-Colonel Travis.     In  those  days  the  fort  extended  over  two  or  three  acres. 

A  thousand  men  would  hardly  have  been  sufficient  to  man  the  defenses.  It 
was  a  capacious  structure,  with  chapel,  long  stone  barracks,  barrier  walls,  and 
intrenchments,  fortified  with  cannon.  The  barracks  were  loop-holed,  and  the 
doors  were  barricaded  with  semicircular  parapets,  made  of  double  curtains  of 
hides  filled  with  earth.  The  walls  were  so  tremendously  thick  and  strong  that 
batteries  playing  upon  them  night  and  day  produced  but  little  effect. 

It  was  a  troublous  time  for  the  new  republic ;  the  United  States  had  given 
sympathy,  but  no  aid ;  the  Mexican  troops  were  ten  times  as  numerous  as  were 
the  patriot  armies ;  terrible  struggles  against  the  enemy  had  been  made  at 
Goliad,  and  at  other  places,  but  in  vain ;  all  hope  of  succor  was  cut  off  from  the 
soldiers  in  the  Alamo,  although  Houston's  little  army  was  doing  its  best  to  rally. 
Fannin  was  desperately  awaiting  the  attack  upon  Goliad.  The  Alamo  and  its 
defenders  were  left  alone,  to  the  mercy  of  the  "  Napoleon  of  the  West." 

But  Lieutenant- Colonel  Travis  and  the  little  garrison  had  made  up  their 
minds.  There  was  but  one  idea  of  duty  in  the  souls  of  these  men.  Bowie  and 
Crockett  and  Bonham,  and  those  noble  volunteers  who  had  succeeded  in  making 
their  way  into  the  fort  from  the  town  of  Gonzales — one  hundred  and  eighty- 
eight  souls  in  all,  say  some  chroniclers^ — resolved  to  defend  the  Alamo  to 
the  uttermost.  Like  Leonidas  and  his  Spartans  at  Thermopylae,  they  pledged 
themselves  to  victory  or  death.  Then  and  there  did  they  consecrate  Texas  to 
liberty.  The  Alamo  was  stormed  by  thousands  of  ferocious  Spaniards  and 
Mexicans.  The  Texans  fought  like  demons,  killing  hundreds  of  their  assailants, 
but  were  finally  overpowered,  and  were  all  put  to  death.  Two  women,  their  two 
children,  and  a  negro  boy,  were  the  only  survivors  of  this  dreadful  massacre ; 
and  but  one,  a  Mexican  woman,  is  alive  to-day.  The  "  Napoleon  of  the  West" 
gave  his  name  to  infamy,  and  sealed  the  doom  of  his  own  cause  by  this  infamous 
massacre  and  the  still  bloodier  one  which  followed  it  at  Goliad.  The  heroism  of 
the  Alamo  was  the  inspiration  of  the  men  who  fell  upon  Santa  Anna's  army 
at  San  Jacinto,  destroyed  it,  and  made  Texas  free.  Not  even  the  bones  of 
Travis  and  his  men  were  preserved.  The  mutilated  bodies  were  burned  a  few 
hours  after  they  fell ;  and  the  fierce  north  winds  which  now  and  then  sweep  over 
San  Antonio,  have  long  ago  scattered  the  ashes  which  the  Texans  a  year  after 
the  massacre  had  gathered  up  and  reverently  buried. 


XVI. 


THE      PLAINS THE      CATTLE     TRADE. 

THERE  are  many  almost  distinctively  Mexican  types  to  be  seen  in  the 
San  Antonio  streets.  Prominent  among  them  are  the  horsemen  from 
the  plains,  with  their  blankets  well  girt  about  them,  and  their  swarthy  features 
shaded  by  broadest  of  sombreros.  Youths  mounted  on  overloaded  little  mules 
shout  lustily  in  Spanish.  The  drivers  of  the  ox-teams  swear  and  swear  again  as 
they  crack  their  long  whips,  and  groups  of  rough,  semi- Indian  looking  men  sun 
themselves  at  unprotected  corners.  The  candy  and  fruit  merchants  lazily  wave 
their  fly-rbrushes,  and  sit  staring  open-eyed  all  day,  although  the  intense  sun- 
light reflected  from  the  hard,  white  roads  is  painfully  annoying  to  the  stranger. 
The  old  beggars,  half-blind  and  wholly  ragged,  huddle  together,  howling  for 
alms,  and  invoking  ten  thousand  saints,  or,  muttering  to  themselves,  stray  aim- 
lessly up  and  down  the  avenues. 

A  residence  of  a  few  weeks  in  San  Antonio  affords  one  a  good  look  into  the 
cattle  trade  of  Western  Texas,  one  of  the  most  remarkable  industries  of  the  south- 
west.    One  might  with  justice  call  it  an  indolent  industry — for  it  accomplishes 


"The  horsemen  from  the  plains." 


i68 


THE   CATTLE   TRADE   OF  WESTERN   TEXAS. 


"  The  candy  and  fruit  merchants  lazily  wave  their  fly-brushes. 
[Page  167.] 


great    results    in   a    lazy,   disorderly  way,   and  makes   men    millionaires    before 

they  have    had    time    to    arouse    themselves   for   real    work. 

Cattle- trading  is  a  grand  pastime  with  hundreds  of  Texans.     They  like  the 

grandiloquent  sound  of  a  "purchase  of  60,000  head."     There  is  something  at 

once  princely  and  patriarchal  about 
it.  They  enjoy  the  adventurous  life 
on  the  great  grazing  plains,  the 
freedom  of  the  ranch,  the  possi- 
bility of  an  Indian  incursion,  the 
swift  coursing  on  horseback  over 
the  great  stretches,  the  romance  of 
the  road.  Nearly  all  the  immense 
region  from  the  Colorado  to  the 
Rio  Grande  is  given  up  to  stock- 
raising.  The  mesquite  grass  car- 
pets the  plains  from  end  to  end, 
and  the   horses,   cattle  and    sheep 

luxuriate  in  it;  while  the  giant  pecan  throws    down  stores   of  oily  nuts  every 

year  for  the  wandering  hogs  to  revel  over. 

The  mountainous  regions  around  San  Antonio  offer  superb  facilities  for  sheep 

husbandry ;   and  the  valleys  along  the  streams  are  fertile  enough  for  the  most 

exacting    farmer.       There    are    millions    of   cattle  :  now 

scattered    over    the    plains  between    San    Antonio   and 

the    Rio    Grande,    and    the    number  is  steadily  increas- 
ing.     It  is   not    uncommon    for   a   single  individual    to 

own    200,000    head. 

The   cattle    owners    of  Western    Texas    have    been 

much  before  the  public  for  the  last  few  years,  on  account 

of  their  numerous  complaints  of  thievery  on  the  frontier. 

While  I  was  in  San  Antonio  a  Government  commission 

arrived  from  a  long  and    tedious  journey  through   the 

Rio  Grande  valley  and  the  country  between  San  Antonio 

and  the  Mexican  boundary,  where  they  had  been  taking 

testimony  with  regard  to  the  Mexican  outrages. 

Opinion  seems  somewhat  divided  as   to  the  extent 

and  nature  of  the  damage  done  the  cattle- raising  inter- 
est by  the  Mexicans,  some  Texans  even  asserting  that 

the  Texan  claims  are  grossly  exaggerated,  and  that  there 

has  been  much  stealing  on  both  sides  of  the  Rio  Grande. 

But  the  commission  itself  has  taken  testimony  with  great  r. 

care,    and,  whatever  may  be   the   exact  nature  of   the  ',: 

claims   against    Mexico,   they  are   enough  to   justify  a 

prompt  aggressive  policy  in  case  the  hybrid  neighbor 

republic  does  not  see  fit  to  take  notice  of  the  demands  of  her  more  powerful 

sister.     The  troubles  on  the  Mexican-Texan  frontier  have  resulted  largely  from 


A  Mexican  Beggar. 


THE      KICKAPOOS      AND     THEIR     RAIDS.  1 69 

an  attack  made  on  the  Kickapoo  Indians.  It  appears  that  these  Indians,  during 
our  late  civil  war,  left  their  reservation  with  the  intention  of  going  to  Mexico,  and 
while  passing  through  Texas  in  May  of  1864,  were  mistaken  for  a  hostile  force  by 
a  Confederate  corps  of  observation,  and  were  attacked.  When  the  mistake  was 
corrected,  the  Indians  were  allowed  to  proceed  on  their  way ;  but  they  found  the 
attack  a  pretext  for  an  offensive  policy,  and  soon  after  reaching  Mexico  began  a 
series  of  distressing  frontier  depredations.  There  were  only  nine  hundred  and 
thirty-five  of  these  Kickapoo  Indians,  originally  ;  and  it  is  now  supposed  that  at 
least  half  of  them  are  dead ;  but  those  who  remain  are  terrible  fellows.  The 
Kickapoo  is  a  kind  of  perverted  Indian;  he  is  unlike  the  original  tribes  of  Texas, 
who,  like  their  neighbors  in  Mexico,  were  mild-mannered  until  aroused  by  ideas 
of  wrong.  He  was  born  with  the  genius  of  murder  and  rapine  firmly  implanted 
in  his  breast,  and  being  somewhat  civilized,  of  course  he  is  much  worse  than  if  he 
were  a  pure  savage.  He  had  not  been  long  in  Mexico  before  he  began  to 
dominate  the  native  Mexican  Indians ;  and  the  Comanches  joining  with  them, 
they  soon  had  things  their  own  way  in  their  new  home. 

These  Bedouins  of  the  West  have  been  a  terror  to  the  stock-farmer  since 
1864.  They  have  acted  like  fiends;  seeming  to  be  far  more  malignant  and 
savage  than  their  ancestors.  Indeed,  as  the  Indian  race  decreases  in  Texas,  from 
disease,  internal  dissensions,  and  intangible  causes,  the  "type  of  the  decadence" 
is  the  most  repulsive  which  the  blood  has  ever  produced.  It  is  as  if  the  savage 
spirit  made  its  last  protest  against  annihilation  tenfold  more  bitter  and  deadly 
than  its  first. 

The  Kickapoos,  in  conjunction  with  Comanches,  Apaches,  and  Mexicans, 
have  carried  off  immense  herds,  and  committed  numberless  murders.  They 
have  been  almost  ubiquitous,  overrunning  that  vast  section  between  the  Rio 
Grande  and  San  Antonio  rivers,  and  the  road  between  the  towns  of  San  Antonio 
and  Eagle  Pass, — a  region  embracing  30,000  square  miles.  They  were  wont  to 
dash  into  the  ranches  and  stampede  all  the  stock  they  could  frighten,  driving  it 
before  them  to  the  Rio  Grande,  and,  although  well-armed  pursuers  might  be 
close  behind  them  as  they  crossed  the  fords,  they  would  usually  escape  with  their 
prey,  knowing  that  in  Mexico  reclamation  would  be  an  impossibility. 

They  came,  and  still  come  from  time  to  time,  within  a  few  miles  of  San 
Antonio,  to  gather  up  horses ;  and  if  they  cannot  succeed  in  escaping  with  the 
horses  they  invariably  kill  them.  At  the  full  of  the  moon  the  Indians  will 
usually  enter  the  vicinity  of  the  ranches,  on  foot,  carrying  their  lassos.  They 
hide  carefully  until  they  have  discovered  where  the  stock  is,  and  then  the  gather- 
ing up  is  a  speedy  matter.  An  attempt  at  pursuit  is  folly,  as  the  pursuer  can 
only  travel  in  the  day-time,  when  he  can  see  the  trail,  and  the  only  hope  of 
peace  seems  to  be  the  extermination  of  the  Indians.*  The  citizens  gather  at  San 
Antonio,  and  discuss  measures  of  vengeance ;  but  it  is  useless. 

The  Rio  Grande  valley  has  always  been  the  paradise  of  stock-farming. 
Before  the  Spaniards  had  left  the  Texan  country,  the  whole  section  between  the 

*  I  believe  the  Kickapoos  in  question  have  been  removed  from  Mexico  to  some  reservation, 
but  there  are  still  Indians  enough  left  in  Texas  to  keep  stock-stealing  up  to  its  old  standard. 


170 


MEXICAN     THIEVERY — CATTLE      "TRAILS." 


Rio  Grande  and  the  Nueces  was  covered  with  stock.  The  Indians  were  in  those 
days  employed  in  herding  cattle ;  imagine  one  of  them  engaged  in  such  a  gentle, 
pastoral  occupation  to-day !  As  soon  as  the  influence  of  the  missionaries  began 
to  wane,  the  Indians  ceased  herding,  and  returned  to  their  old  habits  of  murder 
and  rapine. 

The  United  States  Commissioners  to  Texas  are  of  opinion  that  not  only  have 
the  Indians  been  aided  and  abetted  by  Mexicans  in  their  stealing  from  the  ran- 
cheros  of  Western  Texas,  but  that  Mexicans  themselves  are  directly  engaged  in 
the  stealing.  So  great  has  been  the  loss  from  these  causes  since  the  war,  that 
the  number  of  cattle  now  grazing  west  of  San  Antonio  is  between  two-thirds  and 
three-fourths  less  than  in  1866. 

But  the  stock- raisers,  despite  the  many  dangers  and  vexations  which  beset 
them,  are  a  healthy,  happy  set.  Their  manners  have  a  tinge  of  Spanish  gravity 
and  courtesy ;  they  are  sun-browned,  stalwart  men,  unused  to  the  atmosphere  of 
cities,  and  in  love  with  the  freedom  of  the  plains. 


"The  citizens  gather  at  San  Antonio,  and  discuss  measures  of  vengeance  "       [Page  169.] 

Their  herds  of  thousands  range  at  will  over  the  unfenced  lands,  and  only  once 
yearly  do  the  stout  rancheros  drive  them  up  to  be  examined,  branded,  and 
separated.  Ownership  is  determined  by  peculiar  brands  and  ear- marks,  records 
of  which  are  kept  in  the  offices  of  the  county  clerks,  and  published  in  the  news- 
papers. There  is  a  stock-raisers'  association  which  has  decided  on  rules  for 
mutual  protection  and  aid. 

In  1872  there  were  450,000  cattle  driven  overland  from  Western  Texas  to 
Kansas,  through  the  Indian  Territory,  by  Bluff  Creek  and  Caldwell,  up  the 
famous  "  Chisholm  trail."  In  1871  as  many  as  700,000  were  driven  across. 
The  general  value  of  "Kansas  beeves"  is  $12  to  $13  gold;  but  after  deducting 
all  expenses,  the  average  profit  on  the  "drive"  is  not  much  more  than  a  fair  rate 
of  interest  on  the  money  invested.  The  cattle  interest  is  rather  heavily  taxed 
for  transportation,  and  suffers  in  consequence. 


WILD     TEXAN      CATTLE MAVERICK'S      BULLS. 


171 


But  few  cattle  are  transported  by  sea,  the  outlet  for  the  trade  by  way  of 
Indianola  having  never  been  very  successful.  The  Morgan  steamships  carry 
perhaps  40,000  beeves  yearly  that  way.  The  two  great  shipping  points  in 
1872-73  were  Wichita,  on  a  branch  of  the  Atchison,  Topeka  and  Santa  Fe  rail- 
road, at  the  junction  of  the  Arkansas  and  Little  Arkansas  rivers,  and  Ellsworth, 
on  the  Kansas  Pacific  railroad.  The  whole  country,  at  the  time  of  transit,  is 
covered  with  vast  herds,  which  begin  to  arrive  in  Kansas  early  in  May  and  await 
buyers  there.  A  stampede  is  something  which  baffles  description ;  you  must 
witness  it.  It  is  a  tempest  of  horns  and  tails,  a  thunder  of  hoofs,  a  lightning  of 
wild  eyes ;   I  can  describe  it  no  better. 

Merely  to  see  a  man  on  foot  is  sometimes  sufficient  to  set  Texan  cattle  into  a 
frenzy  of  fear,  and  a  speedy  stampede ;  for  the  great  majority  of  them  have 
never  been  approached  save  by  men  on  horseback.  The  gathering  up  of  stock  is 
no  light  task,  as  a  herd    of  75,000  cattle  will   range  over  an    area  fifty  miles 


wide  by  100  miles  long. 
Large  stock- raisers  are 
always  increasing  their 
stock  by  buying  herds 
adjacent  to  their  ranges. 
Many  persons  make  for- 
tunes by  simply  gathering 
up  and  branding  the 
cattle  which  the  rightful 
owners  have  neglected 
to  brand ;  cattle  found 
unbranded,  and  a  year 
old,  being  known  as 
"  Mavericks." 

The  origin  of  this 
name  is  very  funny. 
Colonel  Maverick,  an  old 
and  wealthy  citizen  of 
San  Antonio,  once  placed 
a  small  herd  of  cattle  on 
an   island    in    Matagorda 


many  other  things  to 
think  of,  soon  forgot  all 
about  them.  After  a 
lapse  of  several  years, 
some  fishermen  sent  the 
Colonel  word  that  his 
cattle  had  increased 
alarmingly,  and  that 
there  was  not  grass 
enough  on  the  island  to 
maintain  them.  So  he 
sent  men  to  bring  them 
off.  There  is  probably 
nothing  more  sublimely 
awful  in  the  whole  his- 
tory of  cattle- raising  than 
the  story  of  those  beasts, 
from  the  time  they  were 
driven  from  the  island 
until  they  had  scattered 
to  the  four  corners  of 
Western  Texas.     Amonsr 


Bay,    and    having    too  "  A  Texan  Cattie-Drover. 

these  Matagordian  cattle  which  had  run  wild  for  years  were  800  noble,  but  ferocious 
bulls ;  and  wherever  they  went  they  found  a  clear  field.  It  was  as  if  a  menagerie 
of  lions  had  broken  loose  in  a  village.  Mr.  Maverick  never  succeeded  in  keeping 
any  of  the  herd  together ;  they  all  ran  madly  whenever  a  man  came  in  sight ;  and 
for  many  a  day  thereafter,  whenever  unbranded  and  unusually  wild  cattle  were 
seen  about  the  ranges,  they  were  called  "  Mavericks."  The  bulls  were  long 
the    terror    of    the    land. 

The  estimated  profits  of  cattle- raising  are  enormous.      Some   authenticated 
instances  are  worthy  especial  mention.      One  man  in  the  vicinity  of  San  Antonio 


172 


PROFITS      OF      CATTLE-RAISING TROOPS      IN      TEXAS. 


and  Comanches,- 
Mexican  frontier 


began  in  1856  with  150  head  of  cattle;  he  now  has  60,000,  and  is  considered 
worth  $350,000.  Another,  who  began  by  taking  stock  to  attend  to  for  one- 
third  of  the  increase,  is  worth,  about  the  same  sum.  One  ranch,  that  of  Mr. 
Kennedy,  some  distance  west  of  Corpus  Christi,  has  an  inclosure  of  150,000 
acres,  the  fencing  for  which  alone  cost  $100,000.  Many  a  stock-raiser  brands 
15,000  head  of  calves  yearly.  The  profits  of  horse-raising,  making  due  allow- 
ance for  losses  by  Indian  raids  and  American  and  Mexican  horse-thieves,  are 
even  greater.  The  owner  of  a  large  horse-ranch  near  Castroville*  told  me  that 
he  had  repeatedly  endeavored  to  get  up  an  issue  with  the  Indians,  who  often 
attacked  his  ranch — hoping  to  get  them  indicted  and  then  requisitioned  in 
Mexico ;  but  their  tribal  arrangements  prevent  that.  The  chief  alone  is  respon- 
sible for  the  bad  deeds  of  all  his  warriors,  and  any  quantity  of  indictments 
would  never  bring  him  to  justice.  An  attempt  to  operate  under  the  treaty  made 
by  Corwin,  in  1862 — by  which  the  Government  authorized  district  judges  to 
demand  the  extradition  of  criminals, — was  equally  unsuccessful.  The  Mexican 
officers  on  the  frontier  recognize  no  law,  no  authority  except  their  own. 

The  head-quarters  of  such  troops  of  the  regular  army  as  are  in  the  Depart- 
ment of  Texas,  is  at  San  Antonio.  A  chain  of  defensive  forts  extends  from  Fort 
Sill  in  the  Indian  Territory  —  in  that  section  occupied  by  the  Kiowas,  Arapahoes 
south-West  and  south  to  the  Rio  Grande,  and  along  the 
Forts  Richardson,  Griffin,  Concho,  McKavett,  Clark,  Duncan, 
Mcintosh,  Ringgold,  and  Brown,  are  the  most  important  posts,  and  each  is  well 
garrisoned  with  several  companies  of  infantry  and  cavalry.  It  is  at  Fort  Clark 
that  the  gallant  ColonerMcKenzie  has  long  been  stationed.     The  close  proximity 

of  the  fort  to  the 
river  has  some- 
what troubled 
the  raiding  Indi- 
ans; but  they 
generally  man- 
age to  pass  be- 
tween the  forts 
without  being 
observed.  Cav- 
alry scouts  are 
constantly  enga- 
ged   along    the 

Military   Head-quarters— San  Antonio.  whole       defensive 

line;  but  the  men  and  horses  are  but  poor # matches  for  the  Indians  and  their 
ponies.  There  is  no  telegraphic  communication  from  fort  to  fort ;  therefore  the 
officers  at  the  various  posts  are  never  capable  of  concerted  action.  The  line  of 
forts  extending  from  Concho  to  Fort  Sill  is  intended  to  protect  against  incursions 
from  the  "  Staked  Plains  "  district,  where  the  Indians  still  wander  at  their  own 

*  rCastroville  is  one  of  the  most  thriving  towns  in  Western  Texas.    It  was  founded  by  Henry 
Castro,  a  Frenchman  of  great  culture  and  executive  ability. 


TABLE-LANDS  —  INDIAN     TACT. 


173 


sweet  will  over  the  grass- carpeted  plains,  which  are  seemingly  boundless  as  the 
ocean.  The  grandeur,  the  rugged  beauty  of  these  mighty  table-lands  will  for 
many  years  yet  be  enjoyed  only  by  the  Indian  ;  he  makes  a  good  fight  there. 
South-west  from  Fort  Concho  runs  a  defensive  line,  dotted  with  Forts  Stock- 
ton, Davis,  Hultman,  and  Bliss,  the  latter  opposite  El  Paso,  at  the  extreme 
western  limit  of  Texas,  and  nearly  seven  hundred  miles  from  San  Antonio,  at  the 
entrance  of  the  mountain  passes  of  Chihuahua.  Service  in  this  department  is  no 
child's  play;  it  is  a  rough  and  tumultuous  school;  and  to  see  the  general  activity, 
one  wonders  that  more  is  not  actually  accomplished. 


Negro  Soldiers  of  the  San  Antonio  Garrison. 

Railroads  alone  can  solve  the  question.  As  it  is,  the  thirty-five  hundred  men 
in  the  department,  whether  officered  by  General  Auger,  the  present  department 
commander,  or  General  Grant,  cannot  catch  and  punish  the  evil-minded  Indians. 
The  soldiers  are  rarely  attacked;  the  alert  and  logical  savage  seeks  a  peaceful 
prey  rather  than  a  fight  with  men  as  well  armed  as  himself.  Never  advertising 
his  coming,  as  the  soldiers  too  often  do,  he  rarely  meets  them.  He  is  all  eyes 
and  ears ;  the  tiniest  cloud  of  dust  on  the  horizon  announces  to  him  the  approach 
of  some  one;  he  notes  the  faintest  tremor  among  the  grasses,  and  knows  what 
it  signifies;  he  detects  a  little  imprint  on  the  turf,  and  can  decide  at  once  whether 
or  not  it  is  that  of  a  soldier's  foot,  or  a  white  man's  horse. 

When  he  mounts  a  hill,  he  looks  about  to  see  if  there  is  anything  stirring  on 
the  plain ;  and  if  there  be,  he  hides  until  he  knows  what  it  is.  It  is  easy  to  see 
that  recruits  and  unpracticed  frontiersmen  cannot  fight  such  people  as  these. 
Very  few  soldiers  are  harmed ;  it  is  mainly  the  innocent  settlers,  who  have  no 


174  LIMITLESS     PRAIRIE DECAYING     INDIAN     TRIBES. 

idea  of  protecting  themselves,  who  suffer.  Since  1866  over  300  unoffending 
Texans  have  been  killed  by  murderous  Indians  and  Mexicans. 

Great  care  is  necessary  in  traversing  the  plains,  even  with  an  escort  of  soldiers. 
A  gentleman,  returning  from  Fort  Clark,  once  strayed  ahead  of  the  main  party 
and  was  found,  with  arrows  sticking  in  him  and  minus  his  scalp,  dead.  The 
Indians  even  hovered  around  the  Government  commissioners,  on  their  journey 
from  Eagle  Pass  to  Laredo.  For  efficiency's  sake,  the  Texans  should  be  allowed 
in  some  way  to  take  the  matter  of  subduing  the  Indians  and  protecting  their  fron- 
tier against  the  Mexicans  into  their  own  hands. 

Wonderful  land  of  limitless  prairie,  of  beautiful  rivers  and  strange  foliage — 
land  where  there  is  room  to  breathe  full  breaths — land  beyond  which  there 
seem  no  boundary  lines — the  railroad  will  yet  subdue  you  !  Then  there  will  be 
no  more  mystery  in  your  plains — your  chaparral  thickets — your  groves  of  post 
oak  and  pecan — your  cypress-bordered  streams — your  grand  ranges — your  sun- 
burnished  stretches.  Stage  routes  will  be  forgotten ;  the  now  rapidly  decaying 
native  Indian  tribes  will  stray  into  some  unexplored  nook,  never  to  sally  forth 
again.  The  Rio  Grande  will  no  longer  be  a  boundary,  and  the  Sierra  Madre's 
rocky  gaps  will  echo  back  the  sharp  accents  of  the  American  tongue.  All  this 
in  a  few  years,  unless  the  tokens  fail ! 


XVII. 


DENISON  —  TEXAN      CHARACTERISTICS. 


iTANDING  in   the  main  street  of   Denison,  Texas,   the   new  town    near  the 
'     southern  border  of  the  Indian  Territory,  six  hundred  and  twenty-one  miles 

south-west  of  St 


Louis,  it  was  hard 
to  realize  that  only 
four  months  before 
my  visit  its  site 
was  almost  a  wil- 
derness, not  a 
building  of  any 
kind  having  yet 
been  erected  there. 
For  all  around  us 
was  Babel — a  wild 
rush  of  business, 
a  glory  in  affairs, 
an  unbounded  de- 
light in  mere  la- 
bor, by  which  I 
was  at  once  op- 
pressed and  ap- 
palled. 

The  slightest 
indication  of  prog- 
ress was  pointed 
out  as  a  gigantic 
foreshadowing  of 
the  future  preem- 
inence of  Deni- 
son. "There  are 
from  2,500  to 
3,000  people  here 
now,"  said  one 
gentleman  to  us : 
"how's  that  for 
four  months? 
That'll  make  some 
of  the  incredulous 


Scene  in  a  Gambling  House  — "  Playing  Keno"—  Denison.  Texas 


T2 


176 


THE    .BIRTH      OF      DENISON 


folks  take  their  frame  houses  off  from  the  rollers  !" — an  expression  intended  to 
open  up  a  startling  prospect  for  the  future  of  Denison.  But,  indeed,  all  these 
enthusiastic  pioneers  of  a  new  civilization  were  justified  in  their  seemingly  wild 
prophecies  of  greatness.  Northern  Texas,  under  the  beneficent  influences  of 
railroad  pioneering,  is  assuming  a  prominence  which  had  never  been  imagined 
for  it  until  within  the  last  five  years. 

As  soon  as  the  Missouri,  Kansas  and  Texas  railway  had  crossed  the  Red 
river,  a  stream  of  immigration,  which  the  most  sanguine  had  not  hoped  for,  set 
in.  The  North-west  seemed  to  move  en  masse.  The  tracts  of  fertile,  black- 
wax   land,  which   literally  needed  but  to  be   tickled  with  the  plough  to  smile   a 


"Men  druuk  and  sober  danced  to  rude  music."      [Page  177.] 

harvest,  were  rapidly  taken  up,  and  Denison  sprang  into  existence  as  the  chief 
town  of  the  newly  developed  region.  It  was  organized  four  months  before  my 
visit,  and  since  that  time  the  Denison  Town  Company  had  sold  $90,000  worth  of 
building  lots.  The  town  stands  in  a  county  absolutely  free  from  debt,  and  is 
at  the  outlet  of  one  of  the  most  fertile  farming  regions  of  the  world.  Two 
railroads,  coming  to  it  from  opposite  points,  and  not  costing  it  a  cent,  laid  the 
foundation  for  its  remarkable  advance,  an  advance  more  like  magic  than  like  the 
normal  growth  of  a  pioneer  settlement. 

All    the    lumber   for  the   houses    and    business   establishments   was   brought 
hundreds  of  miles,  there  being  none  suitable  in  the  vicinity  ;   and  the  car-loads 


ROUGH      LIFE  —  RAPID      IMPROVEMENT.  IJJ 

of  material  were  changed  into  rough  but  commodious  structures  in  a  twinkling. 
It  was  exceedingly  remarkable,  also,  that  in  a  community  one-half  of  which  was 
undoubtedly  made  up  of  professional  ruffians,  "  terminus"  gamblers,  and  the 
offscourings  of  society,  and  where  there  was  not  yet  a  regularly  organized  gov- 
ernment, there  was  not  more  of  terrorism.  • 

Every  third  building  in  the  place  was  a  drinking  saloon  with  gambling  appur- 
tenances, filled  after  nightfall  with  a  depraved,  adventurous  crowd,  whose 
profanity  was  appalling,  whose  aspect  was  hideous.  Men  drunk  and  sober 
danced  to  rude  music  in  the  poorly- lighted  saloons,  and  did  not  lack  female 
partners.  In  vulgar  bestiality  of  language,  in  the  pure  delight  of  parading 
profanity  and  indecency,  the  ruffian  there  had  no  equal.  The  gambling  houses 
were  nightly  frequented  by  hundreds.  Robberies  were,  of  course,  of  frequent 
occurrence  in  the  gambling  hells,  and  perhaps  are  so  still ;  but  in  the  primitive 
hotels,  where  the  luckless  passengers  from  the  Missouri,  Kansas  and  Texas 
railway  awaited  a  transfer  by  stage  to  Sherman, .  and  where  they  were  packed 
three  or  four  together  in  beds  in  a  thinly- boarded  room  through  whose  cracks 
rain  might  fall  and  dust  blow,  they  were  as  safe  from  robbery  or  outrage  as 
in  any  first-class  house.  Rough  men  abounded,  and  would,  without  doubt, 
have  knocked  any  one  upon  the  head  who  should  find  himself  alone,  unarmed, 
and  late  at  night,  in  their  clutches.  But  the  carrying  of  concealed  weapons  is  so 
expressly  forbidden  by  the  laws  of  Texas,  that  cases  of  shooting  rarely  occurred, 
and  there  was  no  more  danger  to  the  life  or  limb  of  the  traveler  than  may  be 
met  with  on  Broadway.  I  was  too  late  to  see  the  Denison  where  rascals  had 
held  supreme  sway.  Their  regime  vanished  when  the  railroad  crossed  the 
Red  river. 

The  business  men  of  Denison  are  a  stern,  self-reliant,  confident  company. 
They  have  a  thorough  belief  in  Northern  Texas ;  intend  to  tame  its  wildness,  and 
make  it  one  of  the  gardens  of  the  world.  The  Kansas  and  Missouri  and  Illinois 
and  Western  New  York  character  crops  out  everywhere  in  Denison,  and  'is  the 
chief  reliance  of  the  town. 

The  aboriginal  Texan  looks  on,  and  admires  the  energy  displayed,  but  he 
takes  good  care  not  to  mix  in  the  fray  too  much  himself.  There  is  something 
sublimely  impudent,  charmingly  provoking,  in  the  manner  in  which  he  disappears 
from  work  and  the  street  when  a  cold  "Norther"  comes  on;  in  the  cool,  defiant 
way  in  which  he  forces  others  to  work  for  him,  and  the  utter  surprise  he  mani- 
fests when  he  is  accused  of  droning.  He  is  a  child  of  the  sun  ;  he  dislikes  effort ; 
it  gives  him  no  gratification  to  labor  in  the  rough  ways  of  a  new  town  like 
Denison. 

Yet  this  same  man  can  leap  to  the  level  of  a  hero  when  his  rights  are 
assailed;  can  bathe  a  San  Jacinto  plain  with  his  best  blood;  can  stand  at  an 
Alamo's  breastworks  until  covered  with  wounds,  and  can  ride  at  the  head  of  a 
brigade  into  the  very  gates  of  death  without  losing  one  iota  of  his  magnificent 
equipoise. 

But  the  old  population  of  Northern  Texas  is  rapidly  assimilating  with  the 
new-comers,  and  there  is  no  longer  any  vestige  of  the  intolerance  which  made  a 


i78 


THE      NEW     TOWN'S      AMBITION "RED      HALL." 


Texan  regard  a  stranger  as  an  intruder.  Neither  is  it  safe  in  a  new  town  like 
Denison  to  judge  a  man,  as  we  are  forced  to  do  in  large  cities,  by  his  outer  garb 
and  manners.  The  huge  hulking  fellow  with  one  cheek  distended  with  tobacco, 
and  with  his  clothes  all  so  disposed  that  they  seem  to  have  been  thrown  upon 
him,  will  answer  you  with  all  the  courtesy  and  grace  of  a  high-bred  gentleman, 
and  will  show  a  consideration  for  your  opinions  and  your  remarks  which  you  do 
not  always  receive  from  the  habitues  of  a  city.  The  roughness  is  exterior  only, 
and  he  who  contents  himself  with  a  passing  glance  will  not  penetrate  to  the 
sterling  qualities  which  that  exterior  conceals. 

The  earnestness  of  the  new  town,  the  almost  religious  quality  of  its  ambition, 
were  amusing  as  well  as  inspiring.  Every  one  talked  in  exaggerated  phrase ;  land 
values  were  fictitious ;  the  estimates  of  immigration  were  overdrawn ;  the  "  prob- 
abilities" were  certainly  elastic,  but  there  was  such  hope  !  Many  men  who  had 
only  been  in  Texas  a  year  or  two  had  already  become  rich,  enhancing,  at  the 
same  time,  the  value  of  property  in  the  localities  in  which  they  had  settled.  In 
the  little  boarded  newspaper  office  there  was  the  same  dauntless  ambition ;  in  the 
saloon,  again  the  same.  "  Sherman  ain't  nothin'  to  this  yer,"  said  one  man  to 
me ;  "we  've  got  the  riffle  on  her  on  saloons."  He  could  not  even  allow  a  neigh- 
bor town  a  preeminence  in  vice.  "  General  Sheridan  's  going  to  build  a  supply 
depot  here,  V  then  you  '11  see  !"  was  the  final,  annihilating  rejoinder  administered 
to  a  carping  Shermanite  in  our  hearing.  All  the  inhabitants  were  determined  to 
make  a  magnificent  city  out  of  this  irregular  group  of  one-story  wooden  build- 
ings, confusedly  located  on  the  high  rolling  land  four  miles  south  of  the  Red  river, 
and  their  zeal  was  both  to  them  and  to  us  "  like  new  wine." 

He  would,  indeed,  be  a  brave  man  who  should,  at  this  writing,  prophesy  that 
the  great  new  route  to  the  Gulf  will  redeem  the  Indian  Territory  from  its  present 
isolation,  and  bring  it  into  the  Union  first  as  on  probation,  and  finally  as  a  State. 
Nevertheless,  the  people  of  the  south-west  are  firmly  convinced  that  such  will  be 

the  case,  and,  for  various  important  rea- 
sons, the  inhabitants  of  Northern  Texas 
earnestly  desire  it.  The  existence  of 
such  an  immense  frontier,  so  near  to  the 
newly  settled  districts  of  Texas,  enables 
rogues  of  all  grades  to  commit  many 
crimes  with  impunity,  for,  once  over  the 
border,  a  murderer  or  a  horse-thief  can 
hide  in  the  hills  or  in  some  secluded  val- 
ley until  his  pursuers  are  fatigued,  and 
can  then  make  his  way  out  in  another 
direction. 

So  frequent  had  this  method  of  es- 
cape become,  at  the  time  of  the  founding 
of  Denison,  that  the  law-abiding  citizens 
were  enraged ;  and  the  famous  deputy  - 
■  Red  Hail."  sheriff,  "Red   Hall,"  a   young  man   of 


A      GOOD      CONSTABLE SHERMAN.  1 79 

great  courage  and  unflinching  "nerve,"  determined  to  attempt  the  capture  of 
some  of  the  desperadoes.  Arming  himself  with  a  Winchester  rifle,  and  with  his 
belt  garnished  with  navy  revolvers,  he  kept  watch  on  certain  professional  crim- 
inals. One  day,  soon  after  a  horse-thief  had  been  heard  from  in  a  brilliant 
dash  of  grand  larceny,  he  repaired  to  the  banks  of  the  Red  river,  confident  that 
the  thief  would  attempt  to  flee. 

In  due  time,  the  fugitive  and  two  of  his  friends  appeared  at  the  river,  all 
armed  to  the  teeth,  and  while  awaiting  the  ferry-boat,  were  visited  by  Hall,  who 
drew  a  bead  upon  them,  and  ordered  them  to  throw  down  their  arms.  They 
refused,  and  a  deadly  encounter  was  imminent;  but  he  finally  awed  them  into  sub- 
mission, threatening  to  have  the  thief's  comrades  arrested  for  carrying  concealed 
weapons.  They  delivered  up  their  revolvers  and  even  their  rifles,  and  fled,  and 
the  horse-thief,  rather  than  risk  a  passage-at-arms  with  the  redoubtable  Hall, 
returned  with  him  to  Denison,  after  giving  the  valiant  young  constable  some 
ugly  wounds  on  the  head  with  his  fist.  The  passage  of  the  river  having  thus 
been  successfully  disputed  by  the  law,  the  rogues  became  somewhat  more  wary. 

"Red  Hall"  seemed  to  bear  a  charmed  life.  He  moved  about  tranquilly 
every  day  in  a  community  where  there  were  doubtless  an  hundred  men  who 
would  have  delighted  to  shed  his  blood ;  was  often  called  to  interfere  in  broils 
at  all  hours  of  the  night ;  yet  his  life  went  on.  He  had  been  ambushed  and 
shot  at,  and  threatened  times  innumerable,  yet  had  always  exhibited  a  scorn 
for  his  enemies,  which  finally  ended  in  forcing  them  to  admire  him.  When 
he  visited  me  on  my  arrival  in  Denison,  he  remarked,  "  I  shall  see  you  in  Sher- 
man Monday,  as  I  have  some  prisoners  to  take  to  court  there ;"  but  Monday 
morning,  as  I  was  starting  for  Sherman,  he  informed  me  that  when  he  awoke  in 
the  morning,  he  was  surrounded  by  armed  men ;  a  pistol  was  held  under  his 
nose ;  and  he  was  told  that  he  was  arrested  at  the  instance  of  the  United  States 
Marshal,  to  whom  some  one  had  been  retailing  slanders  concerning  him.  Even 
as  he  spoke  he  was  vigilantly  guarded  by  armed  men.  But  in  the  afternoon  he 
was  free  again — once  more  in  authority,  and  awing  the  ruffians  into  a  proper 
respect. 

The  tracks  of  the  great  railway  connecting  Northern  Texas  with  the  outer 
world  had  but  just  been  completed  to  Denison  when  I  visited  the  town,  but  the 
huge  freight-houses  were  already  filled  with  merchandise  awaiting  transportation 
to  the  interior.  The  Overland  Transportation  Company  was  closing  its  books,  for 
the  Texas  Central  railway  line  was  expected  in  a  few  weeks  to  reach  the  Red 
river,  and  the  great  Gulf  route  would  be  complete. 

Staging  to  Sherman,  we  passed  immense  wagon-trains  of  merchandise,  creak- 
ing forward  through  the  wax-like  soil,  which  clung  in  such  masses  to  the  wheels 
that  the  teams  stopped  from  time  to  time,  discouraged.  Gangs  of  stout  fellows 
from  Illinois  and  Missouri  were  marching  along  the  highways,  en  route  for  the 
railroad  lines  which  they  were  to  aid  in  constructing;  mule-teams,  drawing  loads 
of  lumber,  each  team  driven  by  a  six-foot  Texan  with  a  patriarchal  beard,  passed 
us ;  wild-looking  men  mounted  on  horses  or  mules,  with  rifles  slung  over  shoul- 
ders, and  saddle-bags  stuffed  with  game,  cantered  by. 


i8o 


DISCOURAGED      IMMIGRANTS THE      SQUARE      IN      SHERMAN. 


Sometimes  we  met  a  discouraged  company,  painfully  forcing  its  way  back 
toward  sunrise,  the  paterfamilias  driving  a  span  of  sorry  mules  which  dragged 
a  weary  wagon-load  of  grumbling  and  disheartened  family.  So,  faring  forward 
through  forest  and  brake,  over  creeks  and  under  hills,  beside  smiling  fields  and 
along  mournful  wastes,  into  primitive  clearings  and  out  of  forsaken  nooks,  and 
crannies  where  civilization  had  only  made  the  wilderness  look  worse,  we  reached 
Sherman,  the  forty-year-old  shire  town  of  Grayson  county. 


The  Public  Square  in  Sherman,  Texas. 

Glorious  sunlight  enlivened  the  town  as  we  entered  it,  and  intensest  activity- 
prevailed,  the  county  court  being  in  session.  The  town  is  built  around  a  square, 
in  the  centre  of  which  stands  a  low,  unpainted  wooden  building,  known  as  the 
Court-House.  The  "grand  jury"  was  not  far  from  the  aforesaid  building,  as  we 
drew  up  at  the  hotel  opposite  it,  and  was  to  outward  appearance  a  collection  of 
rough,  sensible  farmers,  impressed  with  a  full  sense  of  their  duty.  The  horses  on 
which  half-a-hundred  of  the  neighboring  farmers  had  ridden  in  to  attend  to  their 
marketing  and  upon  the  sessions  of  the  court,  were  hitched  at  a  common  hitch- 
ing frame  not  far  from  the  court-house ;  and  in  the  centre  of  the  square  a  noisy 
auctioneer,  whom  the  Texans  were  regarding  with  admiring  eyes,  was  bawling 
out  his  wares.  The  plank  sidewalks  were  crammed  with  tall  youths,  in  patched 
homespun;  with  negroes,  whose  clothing  was  a  splendid  epitome  of  color  ;  with 


MIDWINTER      IN      TEXAS DENISON     AS      A     YEARLING.  1 8 1 

spruce  speculators — Northerners  and  Westerners — dressed  in  the  latest  styles  ; 
with  dubious-looking  characters,  who  shrank  a  little  apart  from  the  common  gaze, 
as  if  afraid  of  the  day- light;  with  swine,  that  trotted  hither  and  yon;  and  with 
the  hook-nosed  and  loud-voiced  Israelites,  who  are  found  in  every  city  and 
hamlet  throughout  the  South. 

Large  numbers  of  people  seemed  diligently  engaged  in  doing  nothing  what- 
ever, or  in  frankly  enjoying  the  delicious  sunlight,  which  gave  new  glory  and 
picturesqueness  to  everything  upon  which  it  rested.  Now  and  then  a  soft  breeze 
came   gently   from   the    up-  negro   crawled  to  the  side- 

lands,  and  softened  the  effect  J^^^^^V^         walk's    edge,    and    with    his 

of  this  generous  sun.     The  ^^j^i§L\_  ^"ee^  *n  ^e  mud,  blinked  like 

excited  gambler  came  out  -T^^^^^r^^^by— -  an  owl  in  the  fierce  glare;  the 
to  bathe  his  livid  face  in  „with  swine  ^f trotted  hitler  stage-drivers  swore  round 
zephyr    and    sunlight ;    the  and  yon-"  but  rather  jocund    oaths  at 

the  rearing  and  plunging  mules  drawing  the  coaches  for  Denison,  McKinney, 
and  other  little  towns ;  and  the  big  negro  who  guarded  the  court-house  door 
twirled  the  great  key  majestically,  and  looked  ferocious. 

Although  it,  was  midwinter,  the  day  was  as  perfect  as  one  in  June  at  the 
North ;  but  the  languor  which  stole  over  us  was  purely  Southern,  as  I  imagined 
myself  to  be  dreaming  away  the  afternoon  in  lazy  abandon  and  irresolute  com- 
fort, spiced  only  with  the  charm  of  studying  new  types  of  a  common  nationality. 
Toward  evening  there  was  absolute  tranquillity  all  over  the  place.  Not  even 
a  loud  word  was  spoken.  The  dusky  figures  who  sat  crouched  in  the  porch  of 
our  hotel,  mutely  regarding  the  glories  of  the  setting  sun,  seemed  almost  in  the 
act  of  worship. 

DenisOn  was  a  yearling  when  I  saw  it  for  the  second  time,  and  the  most  won- 
derful changes  had  meanwhile  taken  place.  The  Texas  Central  railway  line  was 
completed.  Northern  and  Southern  Texas  were  connected,  and  Pullman  cars 
were  running  through  the  untamed  prairies.  The  gamblers  and  ruffians  had  fled. 
Denison  had  acquired  a  city  charter ;  had  a  government,  and  the  rabble  had 
departed  before  law  could  reach  them.  A  smart  new  hotel,  near  the  railroad,  was 
doing  a  driving  business,  hundreds  of  people  thronging  its  dining-rooms. 

Above  Denison,  at  the  river,  another  town  had  sprung  up,  a  child  of  the 
Texas  Central,  and  ambitiously  named  "Red  River  City."  Newsboys  called  the 
daily  paper  about  the  streets  of  Denison;  we  heard  of  the  opera-house;  we  saw 
the  announcement  of  church  services ;  and  the  notices  of  meetings  for  the  dis- 
cussion and  advocacy  of  new  railroad  routes  were  numerous. 

I  confess  to  a  certain  feeling  of  disappointment  in  not  having  found  more 
marked  peculiarities  of  the  people  of  Texas.  There  are,  of  course,  phases  and 
bits  of  dialect  which  distinguish  them  from  the  inhabitants  of  other  sections;  but 
even  the  rude  farmer  in  the  back-country  is  not  as  singular  as  he  has  been  repre- 
sented. In  extreme  Southern  and  extreme  Northern  Texas,  the  visitor  from  the 
North  or  West  sees  but  little  variation  from  his  own  types  in  the  cities ;  and  yet 
in  the  remote  districts  he  may  find  more  ignorance  and  less  idea  of  comfort  than 
he  would  have  thought  possible  in  America. 


182 


THE      OLD      STYLE      TEXAN      FARMER BAD      COOKERY. 


There  are  a  good  many  instances  of  rude  and  incult  rich  men;  people  who 
are  of  the  old  regime,  and  who,  while  owning  thousands  of  cattle,  sheep,  and 
horses,  live  in  log-houses,  eat  mean  food,  and  have  scarcely  more  than  one  suit  of 
clothes  in  ten  years.  But  these  people  are  quietly  disappearing  before  the  new- 
comers. At  first  they  are  fierce  against  innovation,  and  indignant  at  frame 
houses,  railroad  stations,  and  saloons ;  but  finding  that  they  must  yield  or  retire, 
they  acquiesce. 

The  general  characteristics  of  an  old  style  Texan  farm  were  unthrift  and 
untidiness;  the  land  was  never  half  tilled,  because  it  produced  enough  to  support 
life  without  being  highly  cultivated.  When  a  fence  fell  into  decay, — if  by  some 
strange  chance  there  was  a  fence, — the  rails  or  boards  lay  where  they  fell;  people 


Bridge  over  the  Red  River — (Missouri,   Kansas  and  Texas  Railway). 

grew  up  like^  weeds,  and  choked  each  other's  growth.  Those  who  held  slaves 
counted  their  wealth  in  "  niggers,"  and  sometimes  boasted  that  they  were  worth 
a  hundred  thousand  dollars,  while  living  in  meaner  and  more  uncomfortable 
fashion  than  the  poorest  Irishman  at  the  North. 

The  only  amusement  of  the  paterfamilias  was  a  hunt,  or  a  ride  to  the  county 
seat  in  court  time,  where,  in  days  when  every  one  carried. arms,  there  was  usually 
some  exciting  event  to  disturb  the  monotony  of  existence — perhaps  to  disturb 
existence  itself.  There  was  no  market,  no  railroad  within  hundreds  of  miles,  no 
newspaper,  no  school,  save  perhaps  some  private  institution  miles  from  the  farm 
or  plantation,  and  no  intellectual  life  or  culture  whatever. 

The  rich  slave-owner  was  a  kind  of  patriarchal  savage,  proud  of  his  own  dirt 
and  ignorance.  The  heroic  epoch  of  the  struggle  for  independence  being  over, 
thousands  of  persons  settled  down  to  such  life  as  this,  and  thought  it  vastly  fine. 
What  a  magnificent  awakening  has  come  to  them  ! 

The  mass  of  people  in  the  interior  still  have  a  hearty  scorn  for  anything 
good  to  eat.  The  bitter  coffee,  and  the  greasy  pork,  qr  "bacon,"  as  it  is  always 
called,  still  adorns  the  tables  of  most  farmers.  A  railroad  president,  inspecting  a 
route  in  Northern  Texas,  stopped  at  a  little  house  for  dinner.  The  old  lady  of  the 
homestead  wishing  to  treat  her  guest  with  becoming  dignity,  inquired  in  the 
kindest  manner,  after  having  spread  the  usual  food  before  him,  "Won't  ye  have 


PHRASES PLAYFUL     PROFANITY.  I83 

a  little  bacon  fat  to  wallop  your  corn  dodgers  in  now,  won't  ye  ?  "     This  was  the 
acme  of  hospitality  in  that  region. 

Now  and  then,  in  these  days  of  immigration,  a  housewife  will  venture  a  timid 
"  Reckon  ye  don't  think  much  of  our  home-made  fare,  do  ye?  "  when  the  visitor 
is  a  stranger ;  and,  indeed,  he  shows  upon  his  face  his  wonder  that  a  well-to-do 
farmer's  stout  sons  and  pretty  daughters  are  satisfied  with  pork  and  molasses  and 
clammy  biscuits,  with  no  vegetables  whatever. 

The  negro  is  responsible  for  the  introduction  of  such  oceans  of  grease  into 
Texan  cookery ;  it  suited  his  taste,  and  the  white  people  for  whom  he  cooked 
mutely  accepted  it,  just  as  they  insensibly  accepted  certain  peculiarities  of  his 
dialect, —  notably  "dat  'ar"  and  "dis  yer,"  and  "furder"  for  further;  mispronun- 
ciation which  it  makes  one  stare  to  hear  good-looking  white  people  use,  as  if  they 
supposed  it  correct.  The  Texan  has  one  phrase  by  which  he  may  easily  be 
recognized  abroad :  "  I  reckon  so,"  with  the  accent  on  the  last  word,  is  his  com- 
mon phrase  of  assent.  In  the  country,  when  riding  on  horseback,  and  inquiring 
how  far  it  is  to  a  certain  place,  you  will  now  and  then  be  told  that  it  is  "two 
sights  and  a  look,"  which  you  must  understand  if  you  can. 

There  is  in  Western  Texas  a  more  highly- colored,  vivid,  and  dramatic  manner 
of  talk  than  in  the  rest  of  the  State,  doubtless  the  result  of  long  contact  with 
the  Spaniard  and  Mexican.  In  parts  of  Northern  Texas,  too,  among  some 
classes,  there  is  a  profanity  which  exceeds  anything  I  have  ever  encountered 
elsewhere.  In  Western  Texas  it  is  fantastic,  and,  so  to  speak,  playful.  I  once 
traveled  from  Galveston  to  Houston  in  the  same  car  with  a  horse- drover,  who  will 
serve  as  an  example.  This  man  was  a  splendid  specimen  of  the  Texan  of  the 
plains,  robust  and  perfectly  formed.  There  was  a  certain  chivalrous  grace  and 
freedom  about  all  his  movements  which  wonderfully  impressed  one.  His  clean- 
cut  face  was  framed  in  a  dark,  shapely  beard  and  moustache,  which  seemed  as  if 
blown  backward  by  the  wind.  He  wore  a  broad  hat  with  a  silver  cord  around 
it,  and  I  felt  impelled  to  look  for  his  sword,  his  doublet,  and  his  spurs,  and  to 
fancy  that  he  had  just  stepped  out  of  some  Mexican  romance. 

His  conversation  was  upon  horses,  his  clear  voice  ringing  high  above  the 
noise  of  the  car-wheels,  as  he  laughingly  recounted  anecdotes  of  adventures 
on  ranches  in  the  West,  nearly  every  third  word  being  an  oath.  He  caress- 
ingly cursed ;  he  playfully  damned ;  he  cheerfully  invoked  all  the  evil  spirits 
that  be ;  he  profaned  the  sacred  name,  dwelling  on  the  syllables  as  if  it  were  a 
pet  transgression,  and  as  if  he  feared  that  it  would  be  too  brief. 

Even  in  bidding  his  friend  good-by,  he  cursed  as  heartily  as  an  English 
boatswain  in  a  storm,  but  always  with  the  same  cheeriness,  and  wound  up  by 
walking  off  lightly,  laughing  and  murmuring  blasphemous  assent  to  his  friend's 
last  proposition. 

Some  of  the  small  towns  in  the  interior  are  indeed  trials  to  him  who  must 
long  stay  in  them.     My  severest  experience  was  in  a  Northern  Texan  "metrop 
olis," — its  name  shall  be  spared, — where  the  main  hotel  was  a  new  board  struc- 
ture, without  the  suspicion  of  ceiling  or  lathing  on  the  premises,  and  through 
whose  roof  one  could  see  the  stars.     The  front  office  was  about  the  size  of  a 


184  EXPERIENCES     IN     A     MUSHROOM     METROPOLIS. 

New  England  wood-box;  and  when  some  twenty  persons,  variously  impregnated 
with  questionable  liquids,  had  gathered  therein,  the  effluvia  became  shocking. 

In  the  long,  creaking  supper-room  beyond,  a  dirty  cloth  was  laid  on  a  dirtier 
table,  and  pork,  fried  to  a  cinder  and  swimming  in  grease  hot  enough  to  scorch 
the  palate,  was  placed  before  the  guests.  To  this  was  presently  added,  by  the 
hands  of  a  tall,  angular,  red-haired  woman,  a  yellow  mass  of  dough  supposed  to 
be  biscuit,  a  cup  of  black,  bitter  bean-juice  named  coffee,  and  as  a  crowning 
torture,  a  mustard-pot,  with  very  watery  mustard  in  it. 

This,  the  regular  sustenance,  I  suppose,  of  the  unfortunate  people  of  that 
town,  was  so  unusually  bad  that  I  forthwith  desired  to  be  shown  my  room ;  and 
was  ushered  into  a  creaking  loft,  over  a  whiskey  saloon  wherein  a  mob  of 
drunken  railroad  laborers  were  quarreling,  and  threatening,  with  the  most  out- 
rageous profanity,  to  annihilate  each  other.  To  the  music  of  these  revels  I 
attempted  to  lull  my  wearied  body  to  repose ;  but  did  not  succeed,  and  went  to 
the  four-in-the-morning  train  unrefreshed. 

Even  at  the  station  my  troubles  were  not  at  an  end,  for  on  venturing  to 
expostulate  with  an  employe  for  not  checking  my  baggage,  he  profanely  con- 
demned me,  adding  that  "  It's  mighty  easy  to  get  up  a  fight  in  Texas."  Had  I 
remained  twenty-four  hours  longer  in  that  town,  it  is  my  firm  belief  that  I 
should  have  been  accommodated  with  a  complete  and  thorough  exposition  of  all 
the  eccentric  features  generally  accredited  to  the  society  of  the  State. 

The  people  of  Texas  suffered  greatly  from  the  war;  thousands  were  ruined 
by  it.  Young  and  old  together  went  to  the  fight,  returning  only  to  find  ruin 
staring  them  in  the  face,  and  the  poverty  which  was  so  bitter  hangs  by  them  still. 
The  sudden  fall  from  large  fortune  to  day-labor,  so  general  in  Louisiana,  smote 
Texas  sternly.  But  never,  on  the  whole,  was  a  people  more  cheery.  It  is 
resolved  to  rebuild  and  to  accept  the  advent  of 

"New  men,  new  faces,  other  minds." 

The  beauty  of  the  fair  Southern  land  is  but  faintly  shadowed  in  these  pages. 
It  is  too  intense  to  admit  of  transfer.  But  no  visitor  will  ever  forget  the  magic 
of  the  climate — never  guilty  of  the  extremes  of  heat  or  cold  which  we  suffer 
in  the  North,  and  yet  so  varied  that  the  most  fastidious  may  suit  themselves 
within  home  boundaries ;  one  cannot  forget  the  attractive  wildness  of  the  great 
western  plains,  nor  the  tropic  luxuriance  of  the  southern  shore. 

He  cannot  forget  his  pilgrimage  to  rock-strewn  Mount  Bonnell,  Austin's 
guardian  mountain ;  nor  the  Colorado  running  between  its  steep  banks,  with  the 
wooded  slopes  beyond  melting  softly  into  the  ethereal  blue ;  nor  the  long,  white 
roads,  bordered  by  graceful  live  oaks  ;  nor  the  bayous,  along  which  the  whip- 
poor-wills  and  chuck-will's-widows  keep  up  lively  chorus  all  night  long. 

Nor  will  one  visitor  forget  how,  just  at  dawn,  he  saw  a  troop  of  hundreds  of 
Texan  cattle  fording  a  shallow  stream,  and  leaving  a  track  of  molten  silver  behind 
them,  as  the  sun  smote  the  ripples  made  by  their  hurrying  feet;  nor  how,  by 
night,  as  the  slowly-moving  train  stole  across  the  country,  millions  of  fire-flies 
flashed  about  the  fields ;   how  gaunt  and  weary  emigrants   gathered  in  groups 


TEXAN      SOUVENIRS.  185 

around  the  camp  fires ;  how,  now  and  then,  some  weary  figure,  bent  and  ragged, 
stole  up  behind  the  train  with  pack  upon  its  back,  plodding  its  way  toward  the 
land  of  promise ;  how  the  darkies  at  the  little  stations  where  the  iron  horse 
stopped  to  refresh  himself,  sang  quaint  songs  as  they  threw  the  wood  into  the 
tender;  how  mahogany-colored  old  women  besieged  him  with  platters,  covered 
with  antique  "  spring  chicken "  and  problematic  biscuits ;  how  hale,  stalwart 
old  men  with  patriarchal  beards  and  extraordinary  appetites  for  tobacco,  talked 
with  him  of  the  rising  glory  of  Texas,  impressing  upon  him  that  this  is  a  mighty 
State,  sir ;  fast  rising  to  the  lead,  sir ;  has  come  out  of  the  war  gloriously,  sir ; 
and,  sir,  enough  for  all  the  world  in  her  broad  acres,  sir ;  yes,  sir. 

Nor  will  he  forget  the  motley  throng  of  Mexican  prisoners,  straggling  into 
the  streets  of  Austin,  charged  with  murder  most  foul,  their  great  eyes  glittering 
with  demoniac  hatred  under  the  gray  of  their  sombreros ;  nor  the  pretty  maidens 
dismounting  from  their  restive  ponies  at  the  "horse-blocks"  in  front  of  the  shops, 
and  trailing  their  long  overskirts  before  the  merchants'  windows ;  nor  the  groups 
of  negroes  at  the  corners,  chattering  like  parroquets. 

Nor  the  disguised  army  detective,  slouching  about  the  public  places  in  the 
clothes  of  a  western  ranchero,  prospecting  for  deserters ;  nor  the  gaunt  teamsters 
from  the  borders  of  the  San  Marcos,  the  Guadalupe,  or  the  San  Antonio,  with 
their  half-melancholy,  half- ferocious  look;  nor  the  erect  military  figure  of  "the 
governor,"  with  his  keen,  handsome  face  and  blond  Prussian  moustache. 

Nor  the  typical  land  agent,  with  his  bland  smile  and  diffuse  conversation 
about  thousand-acre  tracts  and  superb  locations ;  nor  the  dusty  and  pallid  travel- 
ers descending  from  the  El  Paso  stage,  their  Winchester  rifles  in  their  hands, 
and  their  nerves  strained  with  eight  hundred  miles  of  adventurous  stage  travel. 

Nor  can  he  forget  how,  one  morning,  on  the  banks  of  the  beautiful  Colorado, 
a  ghastly  cross-tree  affronted  the  sky,  while  around  a  platform  a  great  throng  of 
white,  and  black,  and  brown  men,  American,  and  negro,  and  Mexican,  gathered  to 
see  two  men  die.  He  will  remember  how  the  criminals  came  to  the  gallows  and 
gazed  round  from  the  scaffold  in  search  of  some  sympathetic  desperado  to  help 
them;  how,  in  his  despair  at  finding  none,  one  of  them,  in  derision,  broke  into  a 
shuffling  dance,  and  after  making  a  blackguard  speech,  fainted  as  the  rope  was 
placed  about  his  guilty  neck ;  how  the  crowd  jeered  at  and  mocked  the  two  men 
until  the  scene  was  over,  leaving  the  vacant  gallows  to  stand  as  a  perpetual  warning. 

Nor  will  he  forget  the  moonlit  evenings  in  the  gardens  of  the  southern  coast, 
where  the  thick  clumps  of  cedar  joined  their  heavy  perfume  to  that  of  the  mag- 
nolia; where  the  rose  and  the  myrtle  vied  in  fragrance,  and  the  dagger-tree 
spread  its  sharp  leaves  defiantly ;  where  the  snow-white  of  the  jessamine  peered 
from  the  darkness;  where  the  China-tree  showered  its  strange  fruit  on  the  turf; 
the  fig  put  forth  its  tender  shoots;  the  orange  and  the  oleander,  the  verbenas  and 
the  pansies  all  looked  coquettishly  out  of  their  midwinter  beds  at  the  Northern 
new-comer,  seeming  to  smile  at  his  wonder;  where  the  grape  trellises  were 
covered  with  clinging  vines ;  and  where  strange  birds  sang  songs  in  consonance 
with  the  lapping  of  the  waters  on  the  Gulf  shore,  and  with  the  intense  hum  of 
the  unseen  insect  life,  rising  and  falling  like  a  magnificent  harmony. 


XVIII. 


THE  NEW  ROUTE  TO  THE  GULF. 


A  JOURNEY  from  Sedalia,  in  Missouri,  through  the  Indian  Territory  to  Deni- 
son,  will  enable  one  to  appreciate  properly  the  vastness  of  the  south- 
west, and  the  magnitude  of  the  railway  projects  so  constantly  carried  into 
execution  there. 

The  ruder  aspects  of  Sedalia,  the  Missourian  terminus  of  the  Missouri, 
Kansas  and  Texas  railway,  have  vanished  before  the  march  of  improvement,  and 
the  town  has  arisen  from  the  low  level  of  a  speculative  frontier  village,  where  the 
tenure  of  life  and  position  in  society  was  very  uncertain,  to  the  grade  of  an 

important  junction,  and  a  city  of 
prominence.  It  is  not  very  long 
since  .the  revolver  was  the  su- 
preme arbiter  in  all  disputes  in 
Sedalia, — since,  indeed,  the  streets 
were  cleared  of  all  peaceable  men 
in  an  instant,  whenever  there  was 
prospect  of  a  quarrel  between  the 
bloodthirsty  thieves  and  ruffians 
who  infested  the  whole  adjacent 
region. 

The  drift  of  iniquity  from  the 
impromptu  towns  along  the  Union 
Pacific  line  came  into  Missouri, 
Kansas,  and  the  Indian  Territory, 
as  soon  as  the  project  of  the  new 
route  to  the  Gulf  was  broached, 
and  brought  with  it  murder  and 
wholesale  robbery.  The  men  who 
had  been  attracted  to  Missouri 
from  the  States  of  Illinois  and 
Ohio,  and  from  portions  of  Kansas, 
by  the  excellent  chances  to  enrich 
themselves  in  land  speculations, 
were  appalled  by  the  conduct 
of  the  drunken  and  ferocious 
fiends  who  came  to  haunt  the  new 
towns.      The    projectors  of  the 


THE      MISSOURI,      KANSAS     AND     TEXAS      RAILWAY.  187 

new  route  to  the  Gulf  had  to  face  this  criminal  element  and  to  submit  to  its 
presence  in  their  midst.  Often  it  was  the  stronger,  and  openly  defied  law, 
as  is  now  the  case  in  certain  sections  of  the  West.  But  the  pioneers  of  the  route 
had  had  their  schooling  in  new  lands ;  the  engineers  and  builders  were  men  of 
muscle  and  brain,  of  coolness  and  "  nerve,"  and  moved  quietly  but  irresistibly 
forward,  amid  the  harassing  outrages  of  a  mean  and  cowardly  banditti,  whose 
chief  precept  was  assassination,  and  whose  trade  was  rapine. 

With  dauntless  energy,  courage,  and  industry,  and  by  the  aid  of  generously 
expended  capital,  these  pioneers  of  the  Missouri,  Kansas  and  Texas  railway 
worked  steadfastly,  and  in  three  and  a-half  years  laid  551  miles  of  solidly-con- 
structed track,  or  a  little  over  half  a  mile  for  every  working  day.  When  they 
took  up  their  task,  the  anguish  of  the  war  was  hardly  ended ;  the  total  disorgan- 
ization of  society  consequent  on  the  radical  changes  inaugurated  in  the  lately 
slaveholding  States  made  many  of  the  conditions  of  life  and  labor  onerous  and 
disagreeable ;  but  the  superb  end  hoped  for  always  made  the  difficult  means 
easier  to  work  with. 

To-day  a  tract  of  country  which,  two  years  ago,  was  comparatively  as 
unknown  to  the  masses  of  our  citizens  as  Central  Africa,  is  now  easily  accessible; 
palace  cars  convey  the  traveler  over  the  rich  plains  of  the  Indian  territory  from 
St.  Louis,  with  its  legacy  of  more  than  a  century's  history,  to  Denison,  the 
young  giant  of  Northern  Texas,  with  its  records  of  a  year. 

Two  New  Yorkers,  Messrs.  George  Denison  and  David  Crawford,  jr.,  gave 
the  railway  its  first  financial  status,  and  brought  it  before  the  eyes  of  the  world 
with  its  respectability  thoroughly  guaranteed,  and  its  objects  all  properly 
explained.  The  enterprise,  originally  known  as  the  Southern  branch  of  the 
Union  Pacific  Railway  Company,  was  magnificent  in  scope,  and  found  ready 
support  from  men  of  large  minds  and  ample  means. 

The  system  north  of  the  Red  river,  when  perfected,  was  intended  to  compre- 
hend more  than  1,000  miles;  and  the  proposed  extension  south  of  the  Red  river 
would  amount  to  1,000  more.  The  scheme  was  that  of  a  grand  vertebral  line 
through  Texas,  via  Waco  and  Austin,  to  Camargo  on  the  west  bank  of  the  Rio 
Grande ;  thence  almost  due  south,  through  Monterey,  Saltillo,  Zacatecas,  San 
Luis  Potosi,  and  Queretaro,  to  the  City  of  Mexico. 

The  company,  in  constructing  its  railway  and  branches  through  Missouri  and 
Kansas,  asked  but  few  favors  of  the  States.  It  has  built  the  road  mainly  with  its 
own  money,  and  has  shown  the  true  pioneering  spirit  in  boldly  pushing  its  tracks, 
at  an  enormous  expense,  through  the  Indian  Territory,  without  waiting  for  the 
settlement  of  the  question  of  the  distribution  of  lands  there.  The  same  indomit- 
able pluck  and  persistent  effort  will  doubtless  be  shown  in  the  future  building  of 
Texas  and  Mexican  extensions. 

The  Legislature  of  Texas  has  accorded  the  company  organization  under  a 
special  law,  and  the  general  law  gives  to  any  railway  built  within  the  State  limits 
extensive  land  grants,  so  that  the  people  will  not  be  subjected  to  burdensome 
taxation,  and  in  a  few  years  the  outside  world  will  suddenly  discover  that  a 
journey  to    Mexico   is   no   more   difficult   than    the   present  journey  to   New 


188 


JOURNEYING      DY      "SPECIAL     TRAIN. 


Orleans,  and  that  new  lands  and  territories  have  been  opened  up  to  speculation 
and  profit  as  if  by  magic.  But  the  plan  is  not  limited  merely  to  this.  It  is 
possible  that  in  future  the  line  may  extend  from  where  it  now  joins  the  Houston 
and  Texas  Central  railway  at  Denison,  southward,  down  the  valley  of  the  Trinity, 

— the  richest  in  Eastern  Texas, — to  Gal- 
veston, with  a  branch  to  the  waters  of 
Sabine  Bay,  which  route  to  the  Gulf,  it 
is  claimed,  would  save  from  700  to  1,200 
miles  of  railway  transportation  upon  all 
the  foreign  importations  and  exportations 
of  the  West  Mississippi  States  and  Terri- 
tories, over  shipments  via  the  Atlantic 
ports.  The  value  of  the  Texas  business 
will  also  be  immense ;  and  should  the  Mis- 
souri, Kansas  and  Texas  railway  lines 
touch  the  Gulf,  there  will  be  travel  and 
trade  enough  for  it  and  for  the  Interna- 
tional and  Great  Northern  and  the  Houston 
"The  Pet  Conductor."  anc[  Texas  Central,  even  though  they  double 

their  tracks  and  rolling  stock.  Besides  this,  the  branch  from  Sedalia,  extend- 
ing across  the  Missouri  river  at  Booneville,  to  Moberly,  Missouri,  gives  a  mag- 
nificent direct   line  from   Chicago   to   Galveston. 

As  the  Indian  Territory  boasts  no  towns  worthy  the  name  along  either  of  the 
two  lines  of  rail  which  penetrate  its  domain,  the  railroad  company  placed  at  the 
disposition  of  our  party  a  superb  hotel  car,  equipped  with  kitchen,  drawing,  and 
sleeping-room.  The  larder  of  the  traveling-home  was  well  stocked ;  engineer, 
fireman,  and  brakeman  took  their  rifles,  prepared  for  an  encounter  with  deer,  or 
to  chase  the  cautious  wild  turkey ;  and  a  merry  party,  one  frosty  morning  in 
January  of  1873,  rattled  out  of  Sedalia.  Both  artist  and  writer  were  fascinated 
with  this  perfection  of  travel,  this  journeying  so 
thoroughly  at  one's  own  will,  with  power  to  stop 
at  every  turn,  and  with  no  feeling  of  haste.  The 
presiding  genii  of  the  train,  "the  Pet  Conductor" 
and  "  Charlie,"  made  the  travel  through  the 
wilds  as  comfortable  as  the  journey  of  an  em- 
peror. Wherever  it  seemed  to  us  good,  we  dis- 
missed our  train  to  a  side  track,  and  wandered  off. 
The  Missouri  towns  in  this  section  were  passed 
over  with  a  cursory  glance,  as  being  so  much 
alike  in  general  character.  Windsor  was  a  sleepy 
place ;  Calhoun  sleepier  and  older.  The  latter 
village  was  a  cluster  of  ill-looking  buildings,  grouped  around  a  muddy  square.  At 
the  time  we  saw  it,  there  was  also  snow  enough  to  make  it  uncomfortable.  "Yer 
ought  to  see  it  Sundays,"  said  an  informant  at  the  depot,  "when  them  fellows 
get  full   of  tangle-foot.      They  kin  just  fight !  "      But  the   railroad   is  bringing 


'  Charlie." 


SMALL     TOWNS     IN     MISSOURI. 


Calhoun  a  better  future.  A  little  farther  on,  we  paused  before  the  entrance  to 
a  shaft  sunk  in  one  of  those  rich  veins  of  coal  which  crop  out  in  all  this  section. 
An  old  man,  dwarfed  and  bent,  but  still  vigorous,  the  very  image  of  a  gnome, 
conducted  us  into  the  narrow  galleries,  a  hundred  and  fifty  feet  below  the 
surface,  where  we  crawled  on  our  hands  and  knees  along  passages  scarcely 
three  feet  high,  examining  the  superb  strata  into  which  the  railway  company 
delves  for  fuel.  A  railway  built  over  a  coal-bed  gives  its  corporation  no  cause 
for  complaint,  although,  far  as  the  eye  can  reach,  on  either  hand,  there  may  be 
scarcely  a  stick  of  timber  to  be  seen. 

The  men  and  women  in  these  small  Missouri  towns  had  a  grave,  preoccupied 
look,  doubtless  born  of  the  hard  ways  of  the  West.  The  farming  population  in 
that  section  is 
none  too  prosper- 
ous, and  rarely 
has  any  ready 
money.  The  im- 
mense dispropor- 
tion between  the 
cost  of  labor  and 
implements  for 
producing  crops, 
and  the  prices 
of  the  produce  it- 
self, has  made  sad 
havoc  with  many 
brilliant  pros- 
pects. At  that 
time,  throughout 
that  part  of  the 
South  -  west,    the 

tillers  of  the  soil  were  savagely  discon- 
tent.    Many  with  whom  we  conversed 

spoke  with  great  bitterness  of  the  difficulty  of  obtain-       ■■! .'.'.'.*  >' 
ing     proper    representation    in  Congress    on    the  .^ 

subject  of  their   grievances.       In   this  first  day's  journeying  it 
was  curious  to  note  how  the  advent  of  the  railway  had  caused 
whole   towns    and  villages   to    change  their  location,   and  come  tumbling       :=B;1 
miles  across  the  prairie,  to  put  themselves  in  direct  communication  with  the 
outer  world.     Sometimes,  at  a  little  station,  we  were  shown,  far  off,  on  the 
horizon,  a  landmark  of  the  village's  former  site,  and  told  that  the  citizens  one  day 
set  their  houses  upon  wheels,  and  had  them  dragged  by  long  trains  of  oxen  to  the 
railway  line.      For  a  time  everything  was  in  transition ;   people  had  to  give  up 
church  on  Sundays  until  the  "meeting-house  came  over  to  the  new  village;"  a 
gambling-hell,  and  the  house  of  a  pious  citizen  often  jogging  along  for  days  in- 
friendly  company.      Sometimes  a  great  wind,  turning  a  whole  migratory  village 


190 


DISCOURAGED      COMMUNITIES. 


upside  down,  would  compel  the  vigorous  "  bull- whackers"   to  shout  themselves 
hoarse  in  their  efforts  to  right  things. 

Instances  of  discouraged  towns  were  abundant  on  every  hand.  Here  and 
there  we  came  to  a  long  street,  bordered  by  white  one-story  board  structures 
and  plank  walks,  and  inhabited  by  a  bevy  of  dejected  and  annoyed  colonists, 
forever  cursing  their  lack  of  judgment  in  not  having  selected  the  site  destined 
to  be  the  great  railway  city  of  the  South-west.  Entering  the  shop  of  the 
humblest  tradesman,  we  were  at  once  the  centre  of  an  admiring  and  awe- 
stricken  group,  every  person  in  ,it  manifesting  surprise  that  commerce  in  that 
especial  locality  had  revived  even  to  the  extent  of  the  expenditure  of  a  ten-cent 
scrip.  In  such  towns,  the  hotel  was  usually  a  small,  frail,  frame  structure,  kept 
by  a  giant  of  a  man,  with  a  disappointed  face  and  a  sour  and  envious  manner 


"A  stock- train  from  Sedalia  was  receiving  a  squealing  and  bellowing  freight."     [Page  191. J 


LOADING     A     "STOCK."-TRAIN, 


191 


The  old  Hospital"— Fort  Scott.     [Page  192.] 


of  greeting — a  manner  grafted  upon  him  by  the  hard  facts  of  pioneer  life,  but 
which  it  was  easy  to  see  belied  his  real  nature.  The  women  were  silent,  im- 
passive, laborious,  seeming  to  have  forsworn  folly  of  every  kind,  and  to  be  delving 
at  Nature  with,  desperate  will,  determined  to  wrench  riches  from  her,  even  though 
the  golden  oppor- 
tunity had  moved  on. 

After  Charles  had 
made  all  tidy  for  bed 
within  the  palace-car, 
on  the  first  evening 
of  the  journey,  we 
wandered  among  the 
drovers  and  herdsmen 
at  one  of  the  great 
stock -yards  on  the 
railway  line.  A 
stock -train  from  Se- 
dalia  was  receiving, a 
squealing  and  bellow- 
ing freight  as  we 
reached  the  yards, 
leading  from  which  to  the  car  door  ran  an  inclined  plane.  Along  the  outer  side 
of  the  fence  inclosing  this  plane  stood  a  dozen  stout  men,  armed  with  long  poles 
and  pitchforks.  Presently  the  figure  of  a  man  sprang  out  of  the  darkness.  "  Is 
your  lot  ready,  Bill?"  with  an  oath.  "Yes!"  with  an  oath;  and  then  to  the  music 
of  other  oaths  innumerable,  a  mass  of  struggling  porkers  were  forced  forward  to 
the  car  door.  A  rain  of  curses,  yells  and  sharp  pitchfork  thrusts  fell  upon  their 
defenceless  backs.  They  rushed  madly  over  each  other  along  the  crowded  way 
into  the  car,  those  who  lagged  behind  receiving  prods  enough  to  honey-comb  an 
elephant's  hide.  Now  and  then,  before  succumbing  to  the  captivity  of  the  car, 
some  giant  porker  would  throw  down  one  of  his  human  assailants  and  give  him 
a  savage  bite — these  being  none  of  your  luxurious  pigs  of  the  civilized  sty,  but 
sovereign  rooters  at  large  brought  forth  and  reared  on  the  prairie.  Many  a 
drover  has  carried  to  his  grave  the  ugly  scars  given  him  by  Texas  steers  and 
Missouri  swine. 

The  next  day  was  Sunday,  and  the  one  street  of  the  little  town  of  Appleton, 
where  a  New  York  publishing  firm  has  generously  built  a  handsome  school-house, 
Was  lined  with  tired  -  looking  women  and  pretty  girls  moving  churchward. 
Rough  fellows,  who  had  been  occupied  all  the  week  with  hard  labor,  mounted 
their  ponies  and  galloped  away  for  a  day's  hunting.  We  went  on  through  the 
towns  of  Nevada  and  Deerfield  to  Schell  City,  a  superb  location  for  a  fine  town, 
and  one  of  the  especial  favorites  of  the  railway  corporation.  Thousands  of 
acres  of  rich  land  are  owned  there  by  the  company,  and  many  substantial  build- 
ings are  already  in  progress.  In  the  afternoon  we  came  to  the  prosperous  little 
town  of  Fort  Scott,  in  Kansas,  stretched  along  a  range  of  hills  lined  with  coal. 

13 


192 


FORT      SCOTT PARSONS. 


Situated  directly  at  the  junction  of  the  Kansas  City,  Fort  Scott  and  Gulf 
railway  with  the  Missouri,  Kansas  and  Texas,  and  crowded  with  enterprising  and 
industrious  citizens,  Fort  Scott  is  destined  to  a  large  prosperity.  The  Govern- 
ment post  there  was  long  ago  deserted ;  nothing  remains  of  it  but  a  few  barrack 
buildings,  grouped  around  a  weed- grown  square,  and  the  old  hospital,  which 
decay  aids  in  rendering  picturesque.  The  building  of  the  new  Gulf  route  has 
had  a  great  influence  for  good  upon  Fort  Scott  and  the  surrounding  country ; 
and  although  the  reclamation  of  lands  of  the  railway  company  from  people  who 
claim  to  have  acquired  a  title  to  them  by  occupancy  has  occasioned  some  trouble, 
it  is  expected  that  a  satisfactory  arrangement  may  be  reached. 

This  was  a  lawless  section  but  a  few  years  ago ;  now  the  security  of  life 
and  property  are  as  great  as  in  any  community  in  the  world.  The  era  of 
crime  passed  with  the  building  of  the  new  railway,  and  found  no  inducement  to 
linger  even  for  a  moment.     It  has  been  a  sweeping  change,  this  metamorphosis 

of  Kansas,  from  the 
condition  of  a  wild 
territory,  whose  lands 
were  held  and  inhab- 
ited solely  by  the  In- 
dians driven  west  of 
the  Mississippi,  into  a 
transplanted  New 
England.  In  1  8  4 1 
Fort  Scott  was  a  post 
with  which  to  hold 
the  savages  in  check; 
now  a  full-blooded 
Indian  is  hardly  to  be 
met  with  in  the  vi- 
cinity. Thirty-five 
miles  below  Fort  Scott 
we    came    to    Osage 

Bridge  over  the  Marmiton  River,  near  Fort  Scott  mission,  where  a  good 

Jesuit,  Father  Schumacher,  began  his  labors  among  the  Indians  a  quarter  of  a 
century  ago ;  and  from  the  mission  a  rapid  run  of  a  few  miles  brought  us  to 
Parsons — a  thriving  town  named  in  honor  of  the  president  of  the  Missouri, 
Kansas  and  Texas  railway. 

Parsons,  of  course,  owes  its  existence  to  this  road.  From  the  town  the  route 
extends  southward  to  the  Indian  Territory  and  to  Texas;  and  north-west,  through 
the  thriving  towns  of  Neosho  Falls,  Burlington,  Emporia,  and  Council  Grove, 
the  line  stretches  to  Junction  City,  where  the  Kansas  Pacific  joins  it.  The 
entrepot  for  the  rich  regions  between  the  boundary  of  the  Indian  Territory  and 
the  plains, — all  the  wonderfully  fertile  Neosho  Valley, — it  is  not  surprising  that 
the  growth  of  the  town  has  been  rapid.  Less  than  a  month  after  Parsons  was 
"started,"  in  1871,  upward  of  one  hundred  lots,  on  which  parties  were  pledged 


THE      NEOSHO      VALLEY. 


193 


to  put  up  buildings  worth  at  least  $1,000,  had  been  sold;  and  at  present  the 
town  boasts  good  hotels,  churches,  handsome  residences,  banks,  and  large  stone 
railway  shops.  Land  has  already  assumed  a  marked  speculative  value  in  many 
of  these  towns;  but  at  Parsons,  as  indeed  throughout  the  Neosho  Valley,  the 
opportunities  for  invest- 
ment are  still  magnificent. 
The  town  is  one  of  the 
great  centres  for  the  trade 
and  travel  of  at  least  fifty 
thriving  towns  and  villages, 
into  which  the  immigration 
from  all  parts  of  the  West 
is  rapidly  flowing.  The 
valley  offers  homes  to 
thousands  of  people,  on 
terms  which  the  poorest 
man  can  accept  and  fulfill. 
All  through  this  rich 
country  there  is  abundance 
of  timber — black  walnut, 
ash,  maple  and  oak ;  and 
water 


A  street  in  Parsons,  Kansas 

for  steam  machinery,  there  is  plenty  of  coal  and 
so  that  the  various  implements  of  agriculture,  the  furniture,  the  building 
materials,  which  are  now  brought  hundreds  of  miles,  from  St.  Louis  and  Chicago, 
may  be  manufactured  near  at  hand,  the  moment  shrewd  men  of  capital  can 
induce  themselves  to  operate  in  so  promising  an  enterprise. 

The   Neosho  Valley  is  a  revelation  to  one  who  Has  never  before  visited  the 
South-west.      Miles  on  miles  of  wondrously  fertile  valleys  and  plains,  watered  by 

fine  streams,  along  whose  banks  is  a 
heavy  growth  of  timber,  are  now 
within  easy  reach  by  rail.  Hundreds 
of  cattle,  horses  and  swine  wander  at 
will  through  the  fields,  guarded  only 
against  straying  into  the  crops  by  the 
alert  movements  of  the  herdsman, 
who,  well  mounted  and  accompanied 
by  a  shepherd  dog,  spends  his  whole 
time  in  the  open  air.  The  houses  of 
the  farmers  are  usually  of  logs  roughly 
hewn,  but  carefully  put  together. 
Shelter  of  crops  being  rarely  necessary 
in  such  a  climate,  the  granaries  are 
somewhat  rudely  constructed.  A 
corn  granary  is  a  tower  of  logs,  built  like  a  boy's  cobhouse.  No  one  ever  thinks 
of  stealing  from  it.  The  horses  career  as  they  please  in  the  front  yard,  and  look 
•in  at  the  parlor  windows ;   the  pigs  invade  the  kitchen,  or  quarrel  with  the  geese 


A  Kansas  Herdsman. 


194 


THE      KAW      INDIANS. 


at  the  very  steps  of  the  houses;  but  whenever  the  master  of  the  household  thinks 
that  discipline  has  been  too  seriously  infringed,  he  sends  a  sprightly  dog  to 
regulate  matters.  Pigs  are  taken  by  their  ears,  geese  fly  screaming  away,  and 
horses  scamper  into  the  distance. 

As  we  passed  through  the  reservation  of  the  "Kaw"  Indians — the  Kansas 
aborigines — our  artist  could  not  refrain  from  capturing  a  few  types,  and  has 
faithfully  sketched  for  us  the  little  grave  by  the  wayside,  with  the  slain  horses 
lying  upon  it,  and  the  flag  floating  over  it,  to  mark  it  as  the  resting-place  of  a 
chieftain ;  the  stone  house  which  the  graceless  Kaw  has  turned  into  a  stable  for 
his  pony ;  and  the  warrior  galloping  across  the  field  in  the  midst  of  a  pouring 
rain.  The  Kaws  are  dirty,  lazy,  and  frequently  dishonest  beings, — just  as  far 
from  civilization  as  were  their  ancestors  three  hundred  years  ago. 

They  generally  refuse  to  speak  English  to  strangers,  and  will  only  converse 
by  signs.     They  still  sigh  for  the  time  when  their  forefathers  were  wont  to  swoop 


A  Kansas  Farm  -  yard. 

down  upon  the  wagon-trains  toiling  from  the  Missouri  State  line  to  Santa  Fe  in 
New  Mexico,  when  the  traders  were  almost  at  the  mercy  of  the  tawny  banditti, 
until  the  post  of  Council  Grove,  now  a  flourishing  town,  was  established  as  a 
general  rendezvous,  where  caravans  numbering  hundreds  of  wagons  and  thou- 
sands of  mules  could  form  into  processions  of  sufficient  strength  to  protect 
themselves. 

There  were  at  one  time  nearly  6,000  men,  18,000  oxen,  and  6,000  mules 
engaged  in  the  New  Mexico  trade,  all  of  whom  made  Council  Grove  their  head- 
quarters. The  villages  of  the  Kaws  are  remote  from  the  present  line  of  rail,  and 
the  Indians  rarely  patronize  the  road  save  when,  for  the  pure  delight  of  begging, 
they  entreat  the  conductor  for  a  free  passage  from*  one  village  to  another.  When 
they  are  refused  the  privilege,  they  break  forth  into  the  most  violent  profanity  of 
which  the  English  language  is  capable.  Their  vocabulary  of  English  oaths  is 
more  complete  than  even  that  of  the  native  American,  who,  in  many  parts  of  the 
South-west,  is  charged  with  violent  expletives  as  a  musket  is  charged  with 
powder. 


FORT    'RILEY A      FRONTIER     GARRISON. 


195 


"The  little  grave,  with  the  slain 
horses  lying  upon  it."     [Page  194.] 


At  Junction  City,  which  stands  in  a  beautiful  valley,  where  the  Smoky  and 
Republican  rivers  join,  in  a  country  not  so  rich  as  that  twenty  miles  south,  yet 
still  wonderfully  fertile,  we  were  detained  by  a  sudden  snow-fall  and  a  miniature 

whirlwind,   which    blockaded   tracks   and    made    travel 

impossible.  The  beautiful  Smoky  Valley  was,  there- 
fore, a  forbidden  domain  to  us ;  and  we  consoled  our- 
selves with  a  visit  to  Fort  Riley,  an  important  frontier 
post,  established  in  1852,  on  the  left  bank  of  the  Kan- 
sas river,  at  the  junction  of  the  Smoky  Hill  and  Repub- 
lican Forks,  and  three  miles  from  Junction  City. 

General  Oakes,  in  command  at  the  post,  welcomed  us 
with  true  South-western  hospitality.  He  was  for  many 
years  stationed  in  Texas,  and  has  had  a  rich  expe- 
rience of  frontier  garrison  life.  This  adventurous  and 
isolated  existence  seems  to  have  a  charm  for  all  who 
have  adopted  it,  and  very  few  of  the  officers  take  advantage  of  their  furloughs 
to  visit  the  Eastern  cities.  Ladies,  too,  find  rare  attractions  in  a  garrison  winter, 
and  the  forts  all  along  the  frontier  do  not  lack  good  society  from  November 
until  May.  At  Fort  Riley  the  soldiers  support  a  good  little  theatre,  much 
of  the  talent  for  which  is  furnished  by  members  of  the  cavalry  regiment 
quartered  there.  Not  far  from  the  fort  is  the  "  geographical  centre  of  the  United 
States,"  on  a  hill-top,  where  stands  a  monument  erected  to  the  memory  of 
Brevet-Major  E.    A.   Ogden,  founder  of  Fort  Riley. 

We  hastened  back  toward  Parsons,  again  crossing  the  great  Kaw  reserva- 
tion, and  meeting  long  trains  of  Indians,  mounted  on  their  shaggy  ponies.  This 
Neosho  Valley  line,  which  we  had  traversed,  was  the  beginning  of  the  present 
great  trunk  route  from  Sedalia  to  the  Gulf.  Work  was  begun  on  it,  under 
a  contract  with  the  Land  Grant  Railway  and  Trust  Company,  in  November, 
1868,  the  line  to  extend  from  Junction  City  to  Chetopa,  on  the  frontier  of 
the  Indian  Territory,  a  distance  of  182  miles;  and  it  was  completed  in 
October,  1870. 

While  this  was  in  construction,  the  building  of  the  line  from  Sedalia  to  Par- 
sons was  begun,  and  the  whole  route,  160  miles,  was  completed  early  in  1871. 
Meantime  work  was  going  forward,  at  lightning  speed,  in  the  Indian  Territory. 
The  manager  of  the  line  had  made  a  bold  stroke  in  order  to  be  the  first  to  reach 
the  Cherokee  country,  and  obtain  permission  to  run  a  line  through  it,  as  well  as 

to  get  conditional  land -grants;  and  in  May  of  1870 
occurred  quite  an  episode  in  the  history  of  railway 
building.  On  the  24th  of  that  month  the  line  had 
reached  within  twenty-four  miles  of  the  southern 
boundary  of  Kansas.  Much  of  the  grading  was 
unfinished ;  bridges  were  not  up ;  masonry  was  not 
ready.  But  on  the  6th  day  of  June,  at  noon,  the 
first  locomotive  which  ever  entered  the  Indian 
Territory  uttered  its  premonitory  shriek  of  progress. 


"Or-A, 


'The  stone  house  which  the  graceless 

Kaw  has   turned   into  a  stable  for 

his  pony."     [Page  194.] 


196 


THE      INDIAN      TERRITORY CHETOPA. 


In  eleven  days  twenty-six  and  a-half  miles  of  completed  rail  were  laid,  four 
miles  being  put  down  in  a  single  day.  A  grant  of  over  3,000,000  acres  of 
land,  subject,  under  treaty  stipulations,  to  temporary  Indian  occupancy,  has  been 
accorded  the  Missouri,  Kansas  and  Texas  Railway  Company,  on  the  line  of  the 

road  in  the  territory  between  Chetopa 
and  the  Red  river.  The  question  of  the 
future  disposition  of  the  Indian  Territo- 
ry is  interesting  to  the  railroad  builders, 
as  they  have  extended  their  line  through 
the  great  stretch  of  country,  hoping  that 
the  fertile  lands  now  waste  may  come 
into  market.  Until  it  is  opened  to  white 
settlement,  or  until  the  Indians  adopt 
some  new  policy  with  regard  to  their 
lands,  the  Territory  is,  in  many  respects, 
a  barrier  to  the  best  development  of  that 
portion  of  the  South-west.  The  im- 
mense reservation,  larger  than  all  New 
England,  extending  over  60,000,000 
acres,    lying  between  Texas,  with  her 


"The  warrior  galloping  across  the  fields."     [Page  194.] 


1,000,000  settlers,  Arkansas,  with  her  hardy  500,000,  and  Missouri  and  Kansas, 
with  their  2,000,000  of  stout  frontiersmen,  is  now  completely  given  over  to 
the  Indian,  and  the  white  man  who  wishes  to  abide  within  its  borders  will  find 
his  appeal  sternly  rejected  by  an  Indian  Legislature,  unless  he  marries  into 
one  of  the    dusky    tribes    and    relinquishes   his    allegiance    to    Uncle    Sam. 

A  little  beyond  Chetopa  lies  a  long  range 
of  low  hills.  The  new  Gulf  route,  cutting 
through  them,  carries  one  out  of  the  United 
States  and  into  the  Cherokee  nation.  Here 
the  traveler  is  no  longer  in  the  domain  of  the 
white  man;  the  Government  of  the  United 
States  can  protect  him  only  through  the  fee- 
ble medium  of  marshals  and  deputy-marsh- 
als, who  exercise  their  own  judgment  as  to 
whether  or  not  they  shall  do  him  justice,  the 
nearest  towns  lying  nestled  among  the  hills, 
or  in  the  tall  timber  on  the  banks  of  creeks. 
The  railway  runs  through  a  seemingly  de- 
serted land.  Rarely  does  one  see  along  the 
route  the  face  of  an  Indian,  unless  at  some  of 
the  little  wooden  stations,  or  at  a  lone  water- 
tank  near  a  stream.  The  inhabitants  have 
acquiesced  sullenly  in  the  opening  of  their 
country  to  railway  travel,  but    they  do  not 

Kin'lrl    tiMr    fVi^    li'n^      cr>A   firol^r  n^tmnt'vo  ,'f  Monument  erected  to  the  memory  of  Brevet-Major 

Duua  near  tne  line,  ana  rarely  patronize  it.  e.  a.  ogden,  near  Fort  Riley,  Kansas. 


XIX. 


THE 


INDIAN     TERRITORY. 


An  Indian   Territorial  Mansion. 


THE  Indian  Territory  is,  to  its  inhabitants  and  to  the  Government  of  the 
United  States,  at  this  present  writing,  a  problem.  The  area  of  52,780,000 
acres  has  as  yet  scarcely  population  enough  to  make  a  city  of  tenth  rank.  The 
estimated  numbers  of  the  tribes  scattered  over  the  vast  plains  and  among  the 
mountains  are  as  follows:   Cherokees,  17,500;  Choctaws,  17,000;  Creeks,  13,500; 

Chickasaws,  5,500;  Semi- 
noles,  2,500;  Osages, 
3,500;  Sacs  and  Foxes, 
468;  Shawnees,  670; 
Cheyennes  and  Arapahoes, 
3,390 ;  Confederate  Peo- 
ries,  170;  Eastern  Shaw- 
nees, 80;  Wyandottes,  150; 
Quawpaws,  236 ;  Senecas, 
188.  And  this  little  band 
of  65,000  people  is  so 
separated  by  great  distan- 
ces, unabridged  by  rail- 
ways, and  by  barriers  of  language  and  custom,  that  there  is  hardly  any 
intercourse  between  tribes.  The  land  lies  waste  because  there  are  not  hands 
enough  to  hold  the  plough,  and  the  country  remains  a  wilderness  because  the 
Indian  jealously  refuses  to  allow  the  white  man  to  make  it  blossom  as  the  rose. 

There  is  something  pathetic  in  the  resolution  with  which  the  Indian  clings  to 
this  Territory,  the  very  last  of  his  strongholds.  His  race  and  his  history  are  soon 
to  be  inextricably  mingled  with  that  of  the  white  men,  whom  he  still  considers  as 
intruders ;  and  while  he  recognizes  the  inevitable  fate  attending  him  and  his 
possessions,  he  fiercely  repulses  any  attempt  at  a  compromise. 

He  now  stands  firm  by  the  treaty  stipulations;  for  the  treaties  made  in  1837 
by  the  Government  of  the  United  States  with  the  various  tribes  east  of  the 
Mississippi,  giving  them  the  "  Indian  Territory,"  on  condition  that  they  should 
move  into  and  occupy  it,  were  comprehensive  and  binding.  The  Osages  had 
been  the  virtual  owners  of  these  immense  tracts  of  land  until  the  advent  of  the 
white  man,  but  to-day  have  almost  entirely  disappeared. 

To  the  Cherokees,  in  1837,  a  patent  in  fee  simple  was  given,  while  the  other 
tribes  held  their  lands  under  treaty  stipulations.  From  1837  to  l845  the  task  of 
removing  the  various  tribes  from  their  homes  east  of  the  Mississippi  went  on,  and 


I98  TREATIES THE     CHEROKEES INDIAN     AGENTS. 

with  the  unwillingness  of  the  Seminoles  to  migrate  came  the  Florida  war.  In 
the  treaties  it  was  provided  that  the  five  distinctive  tribes,  the  Cherokees,  Choc- 
taws,  Chickasaws,  Creeks,  and  Seminoles,  should  hold  the  lands  of  the  Territory 
as  homes  forever.  They,  in  their  turn,  have  allowed  smaller  tribes  to  make 
homes  among  them.  In  1 866,  the  Delawares  and  Shawnees  of  Kansas  agreed  to 
live  thereafter  in  the  Cherokee  Nation,  and  to  give  up  their  own  nationality, 
adding  the  funds  resulting  from  the  sale  of  their  Kansas  lands  to  the  annuities  of 
the  Cherokees. 

The  annuities  of  the  various  nations  in  the  Territory  arise  from  their  sales  of 
lands  in  the  past;  those  of  the  Cherokees  amount  to  about  $350,000  yearly;  of 
the  Choctaws,  $250,000;  the  Creeks,  $175,000;  the  Chickasaws,  $100,000;  and 
the  Seminoles,  $10,000.  The  various  treaties  were  all  revised  and  renewed  in 
1866 — following  on  the  "Treaty  of  Amity"  made  at  Fort  Smith,  at  the  close  of 
the  late  war. 

The  Indians  of  the  Territory  of  to-day  are,  therefore,  just  as  securely  vested 
with  the  control  of  the  Territory  as  against  its  settlement  by  white  men  as  they 
were  in  1837,  and  they  manifest  no  more  disposition  to  yield  their  claims  than 
they  did  a  quarter  of  a  century  ago. 

The  Cherokees  have  naturally  made  the  greatest  advances  in  civilization,  and 
are  at  present  the  most  powerful  of  all  the  tribes  in  the  Territory.  They  have  a 
ruling  voice  in  matters  that  concern  the  general  polity  of  the  nations,  or  tribes 
of  the  Territory,  and  their  manners  and  customs  are  better  known  to  the  outside 
world  than  are  those  of  any  other  tribe. 

Their  general  status  is  not  -below  that  of  the  white  frontiersmen.  They 
are  industrious  and  capable  agriculturists,  and  understand  the  care  of  stock 
better  than  any  other  people  in  the  South-west.  They  live  remote  from  each 
other — on  farms  which,  it  is  true,  they  hold  in  common,  yet  to  which  there  is 
an  individual  and  perpetual  right  of  occupancy.  All  the  land  is  vested  in  the 
Nation ;  a  man  may  sell  his  improvements  and  buildings — but  not  the  land. 

The  Indians  throughout  the  Territory  are  not,  as  a  rule,  farmers  in  any  proper 
sense,  as  they  raise  simply  what  they  need ;  this,  however,  is  because  there  is  no 
market  for  surplus  produce.  The  Government  originally  supplied  them  with 
capital ;  they  do  not  realize  the  advantages  of  gain,  they  simply  desire  to  "  make 
a  living."  Throughout  the  various  nations  there  is  an  utter  neglect  of  internal 
improvements.  An  Indian  highway  is  as  difficult  as  the  Vesuvian  ascent,  and 
none  of  the  magnificent  rivers  were  bridged  before  the  advent  of  the  Missouri, 
Kansas  and  Texas  railway. 

The  "  Indian  Agents " — who  are  appointed  directly  by  the  President,  and 
who,  residing  among  the  different  tribes,  are  properly  the  interpreters  of  all  the 
treaties,  have  charge  of  the  annuities,  and  make  the  annual  reports — usually 
have  much  influence  with  the  Indian  chiefs,  and,  of  late  years,  some  few  improve- 
ments have  been  introduced  at  their  suggestion.  The  person  of  an  agent  is 
always  respected,  and  as  a  rule  his  word  is  law. 

The  government  of  the  Cherokees,  as  well  as  that  of  the  other  principal 
nations  in  the  Territory,  corresponds  in  large  degree  to  those  of  our  States.    The 


TAHLEQUAH GOVERNMENT THE      IMMIGRATION     QUESTION. 


199 


A  Creek  Indian. 


Cherokees  elect  a  "principal"  and  second  chief  for  four  years.  They  also  have 
an  upper  and  lower  house  of  the  Legislature,  the  former  continuing  in  power  four, 
the  latter  two  years.  Bills,  or  acts,  are  regularly  introduced,  and  passed  through 
the  various  readings  to  be  engrossed,  as  in  other  Legislative  assemblies.  There 
is  a  supreme  court,  with  three  judges,  and  there  are  also 
district  judges   and  sheriffs. 

At  Tahlequah,  the  capital,  the  annual  sessions  of  the 
legislature  are  held  in  the  council-house,  beginning  in 
November,  and  lasting  thirty  days.  The  legislators  are 
paid  out  of  the  annuities  of  the  nation.  Tahlequah  is  an 
average  town  of  the  South-west,  with  nothing  especially 
denoting  its  Indian  origin.  The  Choctaws  and  Creeks 
have  the  same  general  form  of  government.  The  Creeks 
are  a  fine  people;  their  women  are  handsome,  and  their 
men  generally  brave  and  honest.  The  Seminoles  have 
vested  their  executive  authority  in  twenty-four  band- chiefs, 
all  of  whom  are  controlled  and  directed  by  a  "principal," 
who  is  an  absolute  autocrat,  having  an  irrefragable  veto- 
power.  All  the  tribes  or  nations  join  in  a  general  council, 
provided  for  by  the  treaty  of  1866,  and  it  is  presided  over 
by  the  Superintendent  of  Indian  Affairs  for  the  Southern  Superintendency. 
At  this  council  only  such  matters  are  legislated  upon  as  are  of  comity  between 
the  nations — the  rendition  of  criminals,  the  joint  action  in  regard  to  land,  etc. 

This  superb  country,  unquestionably  one  of  the  most  fertile  on  the  globe,  is  a 
constant  source  of  torment  to  the  white  men  of  the  border,  in  whom  the  spirit  of 
speculation  is  very  strong.  The  hardy 
citizen  of  the  South-west  bears  no  ill- 
will  toward  the  various  Indian  tribes, 
but  it  irritates  him  to  see  such  vast 
tracts  of  land  lying  idle.  He  aches  to 
be  admitted  to  the  Territory  with  the 
same  privileges  granted  Indian  citizens, 
viz.:  the  right  to  occupy  and  possess 
all  the  land  they  may  fence  in,  and  to 
claim  all  that  remains  unfenced  within 
a  quarter  of  a  mile  on  either  side  of 
their  fenced  lots.  He  is  crazed  with 
visions  of  the  far-spreading,  flower- 
bespangled  prairies,  the  fertile  foot- 
hills, the  rich  quarries,  mines,  and 
valley-lands.  He  burns  to  course  at 
free  will  over  the  grazing  regions 
where  even  the  Indians  raise  such  fine 
stock.     And  now  that  the  railroad  has 

1  i  •  •       .  1  Bridge  across  the  North  Fork  of  the  Canadian  River, 

entered      a     protest      against     Continued  Indian  Territory  <M.,  K.  &  T.  Railway). 


200 


THE     CHEROKEE     FEUD WAR     IN     THE     TERRITORY. 


An  Adopted  Citizen. 


exclusiveness    on   the  part   of  the    Indians,  he  thunders   at   the    northern   and 
southern  entrances  of  the  Territory,  and  will  not  be  quiet 

At  the  time  of  the  emigration  of  the  Cherokees  to  the  Indian  Territory,  a 
powerful  feud  existed  between  two  influential  families  in  the  nation — the  Rosses 
^  and  the  Ridges.  It  grew  out  of  dissatisfaction  at  a 
treaty  made  by  the  Ridge  party.  Those  hostile  to 
the  treaty  claimed  that  the  Ridges  and  others  had 
agreed  to  sell  a  portion  of  the  Territory  to  the  Uni- 
ted States,  contrary  to  the  instructions  of  the  nation. 
A  vendetta  followed,  in  which  Boudinot,  Ridge, 
and  all  the  parties  to  the  treaty  were  killed,  save 
Stand  Weatie,  who  succeeded  in  defending  himself, 
single-handed,  against  a  dozen  murderous  assail- 
ants. On  the  wave  of  indignation  against  the 
Ridges  and  the  other  parties  to  this  odious  treaty, 
the  Ross  party  came  into  power,  and  has  since 
achieved  considerable  distinction  both  by  its  lead  in 
the  affairs  of  the  whole  Territory  and  by  its  loyalty 
to  the  Government  during  the  late  war. 

At  the  beginning  of  the  war,  the  Indians  of  the 
various  tribes  in  the  Territory  were  naturally  in  closer  relations  with  the  South 
than  with  the  North.  Their  agents  had  mainly  been  Southern  men,  and  the 
annuities,  by  which  they  had  become  rich  and  independent,  had  been  derived 
from    the    South,   and    paid    promptly. 

Most  of  the  Indians  knew  nothing  whatever  concerning  Northern  people  or 
politics.  They  had  been  residents  of  a  slave-holding  section  all  their  lives. 
Many  of  the  Cherokees  had  200  or  300  slaves  each,  and  negroes  who  had 
settled  among  the  Indians  also  held  slaves.  In  May  of  1862,  when  the  great 
struggle  was  gravely  accentuated,  the  Indians  took  sides  with  the  South,  a  regi- 
ment being  formed  among  the  Cherokees,  and  placed  under  the  command  of 
General  Stand  Weatie,  a  full-blooded  Indian. 

The  principal  chief,  John  Ross,  used  his  utmost  endeavors  to  prevent  any  of 
the  tribes  from  further  engaging  in  the  struggle.  There  was  presently  an  engage- 
ment between  the  United  States  troops  and  the  Cherokee  regiment,  at  Pea 
Ridge,  in  Arkansas.  A  portion  of  the  Cherokees  at  that  time  threw  down  their 
arms,  and  returned  to  their  allegiance  to  the  General  Government.  William  P. 
Ross,  the  present  chief,  was  among  them,  and  his  father,  continuing  his  loyal 
efforts,  went  to  Washington,  and  gave  a  true  statement  of  the  situation.  He 
remained  loyal  until  his  death,  which  occurred  in  Philadelphia,  in  1864. 

To  General  Albert  Pike  was  principally  due  the  conversion  of  most  of  the 
Indians  in  the  Territory  to  Southern  sentiment.  The  Confederates  made  better 
treaties  with  the  Indians  than  ever  the  United  States  had  made,  and  even  paid 
them  one  annuity  in  Confederate  money. 

Meantime  the  fair  lands  underwent  all  the  ghastly  and  appalling  disasters 
which  follow  in  the  train  of  war.     They  were  occupied  alternately  by  Northern 


THE     STORY     OF     OPOTHLEHOLA — STOCK-RAISING. 


20I 


and  Southern  armies,  and  were  plundered  by  both.  The  Indian  adherents  of 
the  Southern  cause  moved  their  families  into  Texas,  and  those  who  had  cast 
their  fortunes  with  the  Government  stampeded  into  Kansas. 

The  departure  of  the  loyal  Indians  for  the  loyal  States  was  the  signal  for  a 
determined  attack  upon  them,  and  was  the  cause  of  almost  unparalleled  suffering 
among  the  women  and  children.  At  one  time  there  were  fifteen  thousand 
refugees  in  Kansas,  all  supported  by  the  General  Government,  while  hundreds 
were  daily  arriving  in  a  starving  condition. 

The  story  of  Opothlehola,  chief  of  the  Creeks,  furnishes  one  of  the  most 
striking  instances  of  determined  loyalty.  The  Creeks  had  long  been  beset  by 
General  Pike,  who  had  finally  succeeded  in  inducing  a  certain  number  of  them 


to  go  South.  But  the 
chief  Opothlehola,  then 
nearly  one  hundred  years 
old,  and  reverenced  with 
almost  superstitious  awe 
by  the  masses  of  his 
people,  rejected  all  Pike's 
advances,  and,  after  a 
long  and  stormy  council, 
called  on  all  who  wished 
to  seek  the  Great  Father's 
hand .  to  go  northward 
with  him. 

He  hastily  gathered 
such  of  his  young  men 
and  warriors  as  would  join 
him,  with  their  wives  and 
children,  and  in  mid- 
winter, with  but  few  pro- 
visions, and  dragging  all 
their  household  goods, 
the  loyal  refugees  set 
forth  for  Kansas.  They 
were    followed     by    Pike 


An  Indian   Stock-Drover. 


and  regiments  from  Texas, 
and  a  bloody  battle  en- 
sued at  Honey  Springs, 
in  which,  as  in  a  suc- 
ceeding fight,  Opothleho- 
la's  little  band  was  routed 
with  much  slaughter. 

But  they  continued  on 
until  January,  1863,  when 
those  who  remained  alive 
reached  Kansas  in  an 
almost  famished  condi- 
tion. On  the  dread  march 
more  than  a  thousand 
men,  women  and  children 
sickened,  died,  and  were 
left  by  the  wayside. 
When  the  old  chieftain 
reached  Kansas,  his  first 
act  was  to  enroll  his  war- 
riors as  soldiers  of  the 
United  States,  and  every 
able-bodied  man  enlisted 
in  the  service  !     Opothle- 


hola died  shortly  afterward,  at  Fort  Leavenworth,  where  heinvas  buried  with 
military  honors.  The  various  regiments  from  the  'territorial  tribes  on  both  sides 
in  the  war  were  good  soldiers.  When  they  were  led  well,  they  fought  well. 
They  waged  relentless  war  on  one  another.  The  feud  is  still  nourished  to  some 
extent,  and  will  be  until  this  generation  has  gone  its  way. 

Before  the  war  the  Indians  were  rich  in  stock,  and  it  was  not  uncommon  for  a 
well-to-do  stock- raiser  to  possess  15,000  head  of  cattle;  while  it  was  a  very  poor 
and  woe-begone  Indian,  indeed,  who  had  not  at  least  twenty.  Then,  as  now,  all 
the  labor  necessary  was  the  branding  of  the  beasts,  as  they  grazed  at  will  over 
the  unbounded  lands. 


202 


INDIAN     CUSTOMS     AND     HABITS. 


But  when  the  war  came,  the  total  destruction  of  this  stock  ensued !  Hund- 
reds of  thousands  of  the  beasts  were  stolen,  and  taken  into  the  neighboring 
States :  both  armies  fed  from  the  herds ;  and  so  great  was  the  consequent  decline 
of  prosperity,  and  the  distress,  that  the  General  Government  appropriated  money 

for  the  purchase  of  new  stock,  and  now  the  tribes 
have  nearly  as  much  as  before  the  war.  The  only 
present  subject  of  disagreement  among  any  of  the 
tribes  is  the  land  question ;  the  various  propositions 
tending  to  an  opening  up  of  the  land  to  white 
settlement,  which  have  been  made  by  one  party, 
having  all  been  received  with  disdainful  threats  by 
the  other.  Death  is  the  speedy  fate  of  any  Indian 
of  any  tribe  who  dares  to  accede  to  approaches 
on  the  part  of  the  white  man  tending  to  the  sale 
of  lands ;  and  the  white  man  who  attempts  to 
ingratiate  himself  too  freely  among  the  Indians 
runs  risk  of  a  sudden  and  mysterious  disappearance. 
Religion  is  creeping  into  the  simple  yet  logical 
minds  of  the  various  tribes.  There  are  no  previous 
impressions  to  correct,  for  these  tribes  have  no 
mythology,  save  the  gracious  and  beautiful  embody- 
ing of  some  of  nature's  loveliest  forms.  After  the 
war,  the  Cherokees  invited  the  missions  and  their 
schools  to  return  to  the  Territory,  and  the  other 
tribes  followed  their  example. 

There  are  few,  if  any,  church  edifices  among  the 
tribes,  and  the  meetings  are  now  held  in  school- 
houses.  Church  expenses  are  borne  by  voluntary  gifts.  Many  of  the  tribes  seem 
to  have  a  dim  idea  that  they  are  fragments  of  one  of  the  "  lost  tribes  of  Israel," 
and  the  Choctaws  have  a  fund  of  curious  legends  concerning  the  wanderings  of 
their  forefathers  which  tend  to  that  belief. 

Manners  and  superstitions  are,  of  course,  in  many  respects  still  thoroughly 
Indian.  Games  in  which  physical  strength  and  skill  are  required  are  popular 
among  all  the  tribes,  and  the  ball-players  are  fine  specimens  of  men.  Hospi- 
tality is  unbounded,  and  as  soon  as  an  Indian  of  wealth  and  station  takes  a 
wife,  all  her  relatives,  even  the  most  distant,  come  to  live  on  his  estate,  and 
remain  forever,  or  until  they  have  impoverished  him.  The  tyranny  of  mothers- 
in-law  in  the  Territory  is  something  frightful  to  contemplate.  One  Indian  gave 
as  his  reason  for  not  wishing  to  get  rich  the  torments  which  his  relatives,  in 
case  he  married,  would  cause  him. 

Food  is  simple  among  all  the  "nations."  Corn,  ground  with  mortar  and 
pestle,  furnishes  the  material  for  bread ;  a  few  vegetables  are  grown;  and  game, 
pork  and  beef  are  abundant. 

The  hog  of  the  Indian  Territory  is  a  singular  animal.  Having  always  run 
wild,  he  is  as  distinguished  for  thinness  as  are  his  brethren  of  civilization  for 


"  The  ball-players  are  fine  specimens 
of  men." 


MARRIAGE     AND      THE      FAMILY     RELATION. 


203 


corpulence,  and  his  back  well  merits  the  epithet  of  razor-edge  applied  to  it. 
Stock  feeds  itself,  winter  and  summer,  and  there  is  rarely  a  season  when  it  is 
necessary  to  put  up  any  hay.  In  the  winter  of  1871  grass  along  the  Arkansas 
bottom  was  green  until  the  middle  of  December. 

Marriage  is  gradually  becoming  a  recognized  institution  among  all  the  tribes, 
the  efforts  of  the  missionaries  tending  to  encourage  it;  but  heretofore  men  and 
women  have  simply  cohabited  without  formal  tie  and  reared  families.  The  usual 
practice  has  been  for  a  young  man  who  has  become  enamored  of  a  maiden  to 
ingratiate  himself  with  her  brother,  or  with  a  near  male  relative,  and  for  the 
latter  to  intercede  with  the  father.  Should  the  father  regard  the  suitor  favorably, 
he  puts  him  on  probation,  and  at  the  end  of  a  certain  term  receives  him,  and 
presents  him  to  the  daughter  as  her  future  husband.  The  family  relation  seems 
much  respected,  and  is  guarded  against  disorganization  by  many  excellent  laws. 


A  Gentleman  from  the  Arkansas  Border. 


XX. 


RAILROAD     PIONEERING — INDIAN     TYPES     AND     CHARACTER. 


AFTER  leaving  Chetopa,  a  pretty  town,  with  nearly  2,000  inhabitants,  and  a 
point  of  supply  for  territorial  traders,  our  special  train  steamed  merrily 
along  the  broad  expanse  of  prairie  until  Vinita,  the  junction  of  the  Atlantic  and 
Pacific  line  with  the  Missouri,  Kansas  and  Texas  railway,  was  reached.  At 
Vinita,  the  junction  has  made  no  growth,  because  white  men  are  not  allowed  to ' 
live  there,  and  the  Indians  content  themselves  with  agriculture  and  hunting. 
We  had  prepared  ourselves  for  a  sojourn  of  a  fortnight  between  this  point  and 


§!©  the  Red  river,  and  a  brief  inspection  of  the 
culinary  department,  over  which  the  ebony  Charles 
presided,  was  eminent^  satisfactory.  Telegrams 
were  received  from  various  gentlemen  at  each  end 


CHEROKEE      BEAUX — GIBSON      STATION. 


205 


of  the  main  line,  stating  that  they  would  join  us  at  Fort  Gibson,  and  we  set 
out  on  our  journey  with  delightful  anticipations. 

The  long  grasses  rustled ;  the  timber  by  the  creeks  stood  out  in  bold  relief 
against  the  Naples-blue  of  the  sky ;  the  distant  line  of  mounds  assumed  the 
appearance  now  of  a  giant  fortification,  now  of  a  city,  and  now  of  a  terraced 
garden ;  here  and  there  a  gap  in  the  woods  lining  the  horizon,  showed  a  glimpse 
of  some  far-reaching  valley,  on  whose  bosom  still  lay  a  thin  snow- veil ;  and 
sometimes  we  saw  a  symmetrical  tree  standing  midprairie,  with  a  huge  white- 
hooded  hawk  perched  lazily  upon  a  bending  bough,  and  a  gaunt  wolf  crawling 
away  from  the  base.     But  nowhere  was  there  any  sign  of  man. 

The  train  halted  for  water  and  coal,  the  engineer  and  firemen  helping  them- 
selves at  the  coal-cars  and  water-tank,  and  we  moved  on.  At  last,  at  a  little 
wooden  station,  we  saw  half-a-dozen  tawny  youths,  tall  and  awkward,  with  high 
cheek-bones,  intensely  black  hair,  and  little  sparkling  eyes,  which  seemed  the 
very  concentration  of  jealousy.       This  was  a    party  of  young  beaux  from  the 


"Coming  in  the  twilight  to  a  region  where  great  mounds  reared  their  whale-backed  heights  " 

nearest  Cherokee  village.  They  wore  the  typical  American  slouch  hats,  but 
had  wound  ribbons  around  and  fastened  feathers  in  them;  their  gayly-colored 
jackets  were  cut  in  fantastic  fashion,  and  at  their  sides  they  carried  formidable 
revolvers,  which  they  are,  however,  slower  to  use  than  is  the  native  American. 

They  stared  curiously  at  our  party,  seated  in  luxurious  chairs  on  the  ample 
platform  of  the  rear  car,  and,  after  having  satisfied  their  curiosity,  they  mounted 
their  horses  and  galloped  away.  So  we  rattled  on,  coming  in  the  twilight  to  a 
region  where  great  mounds  reared  their  whale-backed  heights  on  either  hand. 
Upon  the  summit  of  one  of  them  stands  a  monument  of  hewn  stone,  doubtless 
to  some  deity  who  went  his  ways  long  before  Columbus  uncovered  America  to 
European  eyes.  These  mounds  seem  constructed  according  to  some  general 
plan,  and  are  of  immense  extent. 

We  went  on  in  the  deepening  twilight  until  we  came  to  Gibson  station,  the 
limit  of  our  journey  for  the  day.     Only  one  or  two  houses  were  to  be  seen ;  a 


206 


STORIES     OF     TROUBLES      WITH      "TERMINUS         RUFFIANS. 


A  "Tenninus"  Rough. 


cold  wind  blew  over  the  prairie,  and  we  betook  ourselves  to  the  supper- table, 

where  prairie-chickens,  mysteriously  purveyed  for  our  surprise  by  the  beneficent 

Charles,  sent  up  a  savory  steam.     The  stillness  of  death  reigned  outside,  and  we 

listened    languidly    to    the    conductor's 

stories  of  "terminus  troubles"  a  brace  of 

years    agone,   until    we    were    aroused  to 

welcome  delegations  brought  by  the  night 

express  trains  from  each  way  to  join   our 

party,    and    to  prepare   for    the    morrow. 
When  we  were  all  snugly  tucked  up 

in    our    berths  in  the  gay ly -  decorated 

sleeping-saloon,  one   of   the   new-comers 

began    dreamily  to    tell    stories    of  more 

terminus  troubles.     "  Not  much  as  it  was 

when  we  were  here  and   at  Muskogee  in 

1870,"  he  said.      "Three  men  were  shot 

about  twenty  feet  from  this  same  car  in 

one  night  at  Muskogee.     Oh !  this  was  a  little  hell,  this  was.     The  roughs  took 

possession  here  in  earnest.     The  keno  and  monte  players  had  any  quantity  of  tents 

all  about  this  section,  and  life  was  the  most  uncertain  thing  to  keep  you  ever  saw. 
"  One  night  a  man  lost  all  he  had  at  keno ;  so  he  went  around  behind  the 

tent  and  tried  to  shoot  the  keno-dealer  in  the  back ;  he  missed  him,  but  killed 

another  man.     The  keno  man  just  got  a  board  and  put  it  up  behind  himself,  and 

the  game  went  on.     One  day  one  of  the  roughs  took  offence  at  something  the 

railroad  folks  said,  so  he  ran  our  train  off  the  track  next  morning.     There  was  no 

law  here,  and  no  means  of  getting  any.     As  fast  as  the  railroad  moved  on,  the 

roughs  pulled  up  stakes  and  moved  with  it 

"  We  tried  to  scare  them  away,  but  they  did  n't 
scare  worth  a  cent.  It  was  next  to  impossible  for  a 
stranger  to  walk  through  one  of  these  canvas  towns 
without  getting  shot  at.  The  graveyards  were  sometimes 
better  populated  than  the  towns  next  them.  The  fellows 
who  ruled  these  little  terminus  hells, — where  they  came 
from  nobody  knows — never  had  any  homes — grew  up 


'We  came  to  the  bank  of  the  Grand  river,  on  a  hill  beyond  which  was  the  post  of  Fort  Gibson."      [Page  208.] 


THE      SECRETARY     OF     THE      INTERIOR     AND     THE      "ROUGHS."  2QJ 

like  prairie  grass,  only  coarser  and  meaner.  They  had  all  been  '  terminuses ' 
ever  since  they  could  remember.  Most  of  them  had  two,  three,  and  four  murders 
on  their  hands,  and  confessed  them.  They  openly  defied  the  Indian  authorities, 
and  scorned  Uncle  Sam  and  his  marshals.  They  knew  there  was  money 
wherever  the  end  of  the  road  was,  and  they  meant  to  have  it." 

"  But  how  long  did  this  condition  of  affairs  continue  ?" 

"  It  went  on  steadily  until  the  Secretary  of  the  Interior  came  down  here  to  see 
the  Territory  and  to  examine  the  railroads.  He  came  down  in  this  same  car,  and 
was  carefully  informed  of  all  the  lawlessness  and  flagrant  outrages  which  decent 
people  had  been  obliged  to  submit  to.  One  night  the  superintendent-in-chief 
pushed  on  a  little  ahead  of  the  train  to  get  a  physician,  as  a  gentleman  in  the 
special  car  was  taken  suddenly  ill.  The  roughs  captured  the  superintendent 
and  proposed  to  shoot  him,  as  they  fancied  that  he  was  a  United  States 
marshal.  He  explained  who  he  was,  however,  and  begged  off.  As  they 
hardly  dared  to  shoot  him  then,  he  succeeded  in  reaching  a  physician,  got  back 
to  the  train,  and  next  took  the  Secretary  to  inspect  this  specimen  of  railroad 
civilization." 

"  And  what  did  the  Secretary  see  ?'! 

"  Oh,  all  the  ruffians  flocked  to  hear  what  he  had  to  say.  They  had  killed 
a  man  that  morning  from  mere  caprice,  and  he  was  laid  out  in  a  little  tent  which 
the  party  passed  while  looking  around.  One  after  another  of  the  rough  fellows 
was  presented  to  the  party,  each  one  speaking  very  plainly,  and  declaring  that  he 
had  a  good  right  to  stay  in  the  'Nation,'  and  (with  an  oath)  meant  to;  and  he'd 
like  to  hear  any  one  hint  that  he  had  better  go  away.  Then  they  told  stories 
of  their  murderous  exploits,  practiced  at  marks  with  their  revolvers,  and  seemed 
to  have  no  fear  of  the  Secretary." 

"  What  was  the  result  ?" 

"Well,  the  Secretary  of  the  Interior  took  a  bee-line  for  the  nearest  telegraph 
station,  and  sent  a  dispatch  to  General  Grant,  announcing  that  neither  life  nor 
property  was  safe  in  the  Territory,  and  that  the  Indians  should  be  aided  in 
expelling  the  roughs  from  their  midst.  So,  in  a  short  time,  the  Tenth  Cavalry 
went  into  active  service  in  the  Territory.',' 

"  Did  the  ruffians  make  any  resistance  ?" 

"  They  got  together,  at  the  terminus,  armed  to  the  teeth,  and  blustered  a 
good  deal ;  but  the  cavalrymen  arrested  one  after  another,  and  examined  each 
man  separately.  When  one  of  the  terminuses  was  asked  his  name,  he  usually 
answered  that  it  was*Slim  Jim,  or  Wild  Bill,  or  Lone  Jack  (with  an  oath),  and 
that  he  was  a  gambler,  or  a  •  pounder,'  as  the  case  might  be,  and,  furthermore, 
that  he  did  n't  intend  to  leave  the  Territory.  Whereupon  the  officer  commanding 
would  say :  '  Well,  Slim  Jim,  or  Wild  Bill,  or  Lone  Jack,  I  '11  give  you  twelve 
hours  to  leave  this  town  in,  and  if  you  are  found  in  the  Territory  a  week  from 
this  date,  I'll  have  you  shot !'  And  they  took  the  hint." 
,       A  moment  afterward,  the  same  voice  added  : 

"  By  the  way,  at  the  next  station,  Muskogee,  a  man  was  shot  before  the  town 
got  there,  and  the  graveyard  was  started  before  a  single  street  was  laid  out.    You 

14 


208 


FORT     GIBSON,     A     CHEROKEE     TOWN. 


can  see  the  graveyard  now-a-days — eleven  men  are  buried  there  with  their  boots 
on.     Good  night." 

The  landscape  was  snow-besprinkled  next  day,  but  our  merry  party  of  six 
climbed  into  a  rickety  ambulance,  and  set  out  on  the  seven  miles'  ride  to  Fort 
Gibson.  As  we  rattled  along  past  the  dense  bosquets,  great  flocks  of  prairie- 
chickens  rose  in  leisurely  flight ;  wild  turkeys  waddled  away ;  deer  fled  across 
the  roads  after  bestowing  a  scornful  gaze  upon  us;  and  rabbits  jumped  painfully 
in  the  snow. 

The  farm-houses  which  we  passed  were  all  built  of  logs,  but  were  large  and 
solidly  constructed ;  and  the  Indian  farmers  were  making  preparations  for  the 
Spring  ploughing.  When  we  came  to  the  bank  of  the  Grand  river,  on  a  hill 
beyond  which  was  the  post  of  Fort  Gibson,  we  found  the  ferries  obstructed  by 
masses  of  floating  ice.  Negro  cavalrymen  from  the  fort  were  in  midstream, 
desperately  clinging  to  the  guide-rope,  and  in  imminent  danger  of  being  carried 
down  river  and  out  into  the  mighty  Arkansas.     At  last,  the  dangers  over,  two 


lazy  half-  breeds  ferried 
us  across,  after  infinite 
shouting  and  disputing; 
and  we  met,  on  the  other 
bank,  "Uncle  John"  Cun- 
ningham, postmaster  at 
Fort  Gibson.  "I  saw  you 
across  the  stream,  and 
was  watching  out  for  you 
a  little  carefully,"  said 
Uncle  John,  "  for  there's 
a  fellow  come  into  town 
this  morning  with  six 
gallons  of  whiskey,  and 
we   expect  some   of  the 


Indians  to  go  circusing 
around  as  soon  as  they 
get   it   down." 

We  climbed  the  hill 
to  the  fort,  a  well-built 
post  usually  garrisoned 
by  three  companies  either 
of  infantry  or  cavalry. 
Fort  Gibson  is  the  resi- 
dence of  the  present  chief 
of  the  Cherokee  nation, 
William  P.  Ross,  a  culti- 
vated and  accomplished 
gentleman,  whom  I  had 
previously  met  in  Wash- 


A  Negro  Boy  at  the  Ferry. 

ington.  The  fort  stands  on  the  Grand  river,  about  two  and  a-half  miles  from  its 
confluence  with  the  Arkansas,  and  is  only  twenty-one  miles  from  Tahlequah,  the 
capital  of  the  Cherokees.  The  whole  of  the  adjacent  country,  except  upon  the 
high  range  of  the  hills  along  the  Grand,  Verdigris  and  Illinois  rivers,  is  arable 
and  easy  to  cultivate.  * 

From  the  verandah  of  the  commanding  officer's  quarters  at  the  fort,  one 
can  overlook  a  range  of  hills  known  as  the  "Boston  mountains,"  the  town, 
set  down  in  an  amphitheatre  formed  by  the  slopes,  the  broad,  swift  river  running 
between  its  picturesque  banks, — a  charming  scene. 

At  Fort  Gibson  we  were  in  a  real  Cherokee  town,  and  at  every  turn  saw  one 
of  the  tall,  black-haired,  tawny  citizens  of  the  Territory.  It  was  evidently  a 
market-day  with  the  farmers  for  many  a  mile  around.  Horses  were  tied  before 
the  porches  of  the  Indian  traders  and  along  the  bank  of  the  river,  and  every  few 
moments  some  stout  Indian  came  rattling  into  town,  his  wife  mounted  behind 
him  on  the  demure  -  looking  pony,  equal  to  anything,  from  the  fording  of  a  river 


THE      INDIANS'     TASTE     FOR     STIMULANTS. 


209 


ill 
J  If,: 

wmi 
HI 

Hill  I 


to  the  threading  of  a  canon.  Many 
of  the  men  carried  side-arms,  but 
none  of  them  showed  any  disposi- 
tion to  quarrel,  and  we  saw  no  one 
who  seemed  to  have  been  drinking 
liquor.  Indeed,  so  severe  are  the 
penalties  attaching  to  the  sale  of 
ardent  spirits  in  the  Indian  Terri- 
tory, that  men  do  not  care  to 
take  the  risk.  The  United  States 
marshals  and  the  Indian  authorities 
pursue  the  offenders  with  great  per- 
sistence, and  a  law-breaker  rarely 
escapes. 

The  Indians — Cherokees,  Choc- 
taws,  Chickasaws  and  Seminoles — 
all  have  a  strange  thirst  for  intoxi- 
cating liquor,  and  often  make  the 
most  astonishing  efforts  to  secure  it. 
All  kinds  of  patent  medicines  in 
which  alcohol  forms  an  ingredient 
find  ready  sale  among  the  various 
tribes  ;  and  camphor,  pain  -  killer, 
and  similar  articles,  were  for  a  long 
time  so  much  in  use  among  the 
Cherokees  as  to  provoke  an  exam- 
ination by  the  agents,  who  discov- 
ered the  braves  to  be  drinking 
whole  bottles  at  a  gulp,  in  order  to 
feel  some  effect  therefrom.  A  bottle 
of  whiskey  is  still  one  of  the  most 
powerful  bribes  that  can  be  placed 
before  an  Indian. 

The  women  were  all  robust,  and 
not  devoid  of  a  certain  wild  beauty ; 
but  they  wore  a  prim,  Shakerish 
costume  which  defied  criticism.  A 
poke -bonnet  nearly  concealed  their 
features,  and  a  stiff,  heavy  robe  fell 
down  to  the  ankles,  while  a  shawl 
was  decorously  draped  about  the 
shoulders.  Many  of  the  Indians 
seemed  to  have  negro  wives,  and 
we  saw  more  than  one  stalwart 
negress   receiving  courteous  atten- 


210 


CHEROKEE  FACES-— AN  OUTBURST. 


tion  from  tall,  copper- colored  beaux,  whose  manners  would  have  done  no  dis- 
credit to  a  salon  in  society. 

The  men,  as  a  rule,  would  not  respond  when  addressed  in  English,  and  often 
turned  sullenly  away ;  while  younger  members  of  the  tribes,  both  boys  and 
girls,  would  chat  cheerily,  and  question  us  with  childish  curiosity  as  to  our 
reasons  for  visiting  the  nation.  There  were  some  superb  heads  among  these 
Cherokees,  with  masses  of  tangled  hair  peeping  in  most  charming  confusion  from 
under  torn  hats,  slightly  shaded  faces,  with  matchless  eyes,  and  features  in  which 
the  Indian  type  of  a  century  agone  was  yet  preserved — all  the  reserve,  all  the 
immobility,  all  the  silent  scorn  being  still  distinctly  marked.  Yet  civilization 
was  beginning  to  do  its  work.  The  greater  number  of  countenances  were  losing 
their  savage  traits,  and  becoming  more  like  those  of  their  fellows  in  the  neighbor- 
ing States ;  still  there  was  a  certain  atmosphere  of  strangeness  about  them,  born, 

doubtless,    of  their    methods 

of  thought,   their    traditions, 

their  almost  complete  lack  of 

sympathy    with    the    whites. 

Never  until  the  war  had  they 

been  called  upon  to  feel  that 

their    territory   constituted    a 

part  of  a  common   country; 

now  they  realize  it. 

From  Fort  Gibson,  where 

Lieutenant- Colonel    Lawson, 

the    amiable    commanding 

officer,  and  his  associates  had 

made  our  stay  a  very  pleasant 

one,  we  rode  back  along  the 

very  rough  roadways  until  we 

The  station- agent  came  to  see  us,  and  announced  that 
some  of  the  "Indians  had  been  having  a  circus"  during  our  absence.  "Came  in 
here,  an  old  woman  did,"  he  said,  "  with  a  butcher- knife,  and  took  a  piece  out 
of  my  chair,  and  a  man  with  her  fired  half-a-dozen  shots  from  his  revolver 
through  the  roof.  But  I  finally  quieted  'em."  Liquor,  or  possibly  pain-killer, 
was   the   cause   of  this    sudden    outburst 

So  we  journeyed  slowly  on  through  the  great  Territory,  now  coming  into  the 
shadows  of  the  prehistoric  mounds,  and  now  into  delightful  valleys,  which  needed 
only  human  and  tasteful  occupancy  to  be  transformed  into  veritable  Elysian 
Fields.  At  night  the  train  was  switched  off  at  some  lonely  siding,  and  the 
baggage-car  transformed  into  a  kitchen.  Then  arose  the  complicated  aroma  of 
broiled  venison,  savory  coffee,  and  fried  potatoes  and  muffins,  or  delicate  toast, — 
the  work  of  the  dusky  Charles,  who  could  growl  fiercely  whenever  profane  eyes 
attempted  to  peer  into  the  arcana  of  the  kitchen.  One  of  the  leading  citizens  of 
Parsons,  Kansas,  presided  over  the  venison  ;  half-a-dozen  eager  hands  conducted 
the  coffee  from  the  mill  in  which  it  was  ground  into  the  cup  in  which  it  was 


"They  wore  a  prim,  Shakerish 
costume."     [Page  209.] 

came  to  Gibson  station. 


A  Trader  among  the  Indians. 


MUSKOGEE  —  RAILWAY     BRIDGES CREEK     SCHOOLS. 


211 


poured  ;  and  the  "  pet  conductor  "  watched  over  the  comfort  of  all,  generously- 
forgetting  his  own.  Late  o'  nights  a  thunderous  roll  and  a  flash  of  light  would 
salute  our  ears  and  eyes,  and  sometimes  a  bundle  of  letters  and  home  papers, 
fresh  from  St.  Louis  and  the  East  would  be  handed  us  out  of  the  darkness  by 
the  conductor  of  the  "down  express." 

Our  train  was  always  in  motion  when  we  awoke  in  the  morning,  reminding 
us  more  of  life  on  an  ocean  steamer  than  on  the  "rattling  rail-car."  We  spent 
some  time  at  Muskogee,  the  railway  station  communicating  most  directly  with 
Fort  Gibson,  and  a  town  which  owes  all  its  present  prosperity  to  the  Missouri, 
Kansas  and  Texas  railway.  Immense  stock-yards  have  been  built  there,  and  the 
arrival  and  departure  of  goods  and  mails  for  Ocmulgee,  the  capital  of  the  Creek 
nation,  forty-five  miles  to  the  westward,  and  We-wo-ka,  the  capital  of  the  Semi- 
noles,  one  hundred  miles  west,  gives  employment  to  large  numbers  of  men. 
Here,  too,  is  a  point  of  debarkation  for  travel  to  Armstrong's  Academy,  the 
Choctaw  seat  of  government ;  and  to  Tishomingo,  the  principal  town  in  the 
Chickasaw  nation.  Stage  routes  branch  out  in  all  directions  from  Muskogee, 
and  weekly  mails  are  forwarded  thence  to  the  interior. 

Between  Gibson  and  Muskogee  we  had  crossed  the  Arkansas  river  on  one 
of  the  immense  bridges  of  the  Missouri,  Kansas  and  Texas  railway,  a  grand 
triumph  of  engineering  skill ;  and  some  miles  below  Muskogee  we  also  crossed 
the  "North  Fork"  and  the  "Canadian,"  both  of  which  run  through  a  singularly 
wild  and  beautiful,  country.  Near  the  Canadian  we  crossed  the  fields  to  visit 
one  of  the  mission  schools,  of  which  there  are  numbers  in  the  Territory.  It  is  in 
the  Creek  domain,  and  is  known  as  the  "  Asbury  Manual  Labor  School,"  being 

supported  by  the  Methodist  Church  South. 
About  eighty  Indian  children  of  both  sexes 
are  boarded,  lodged,  and  taught  at  this 
institution,  and  the  school- rooms  which  we 
entered  were  models  of  order  and  comfort 
The  native  Creek  schools,  of  which  there 


'The  Asbury  Manual   Labor  School,"  in  the  Creek  domain. 


are  twenty  or  twenty-five,  are  not  very  useful ;  even  the  examining  boards  are 
deficient,   and  the  native   teachers    are  only  able  to  give  ordinary   elementary 


212  EDUCATION     IN     THE     TERRITORY — LIMESTONE     GAP. 

instruction.  The  mission  schools  throughout  the  Territory  have  been  of  great 
service.  The  Presbyterians  also  support  a  mission  among  the  Creeks,  called  the 
"Tallahassee  Manual  Labor  School,"  where,  as  in  the  Asbury,  work  afield  and 
in  the  house  is  expected  from  the  scholars.  The  pupils  of  the  Asbury  School 
in    one    season    produced   2,000  bushels   of  corn  from   about  fifty  acres. 

In  the  Cherokee  nation  much  attention  is  paid  to  the  thirty  "neighbor- 
hood schools,"  as  they  are  called,  and  all  the  Northern  missionaries  who,  of 
course,  were  compelled  to  retire  during  the  war,  were  invited  to  return  to  their 
posts,  and  received  cordial  welcome,  when  peace  was  re-established.  The 
common  schools  among  the  Cherokees  were  established  by  the  Legislature  in 
1867.  There  are  schools  set  apart  for  colored  children,  but  no  spirit  of  exclu- 
sion is  now  manifested;  for  the  Indians,  when  the  war  closed  and  they  emanci- 
pated all  their  slaves,  frankly  placed  them  on  the  same  basis  with  themselves. 
Five  orphans  are  boarded,  clothed  and  instructed  in  each  of  the  public  schools. 

Once  in  two  years  a  superintendent  of  schools  is  chosen,  and  he  appoints  a 
board  of  directors  for  each  school.  The  district  schools  are  mainly  taught  by 
women,  and  those  pupils  who  desire  more  than  an  elementary  education  are  sent 
to  colleges  in  the  South  and  West.  The  Choctaws  support  forty  youths  and 
twenty  maidens  in  institutions  at  Louisville,  Kentucky,  and  other  Southern  cities. 
Various  influences  are  gradually  doing  away  with  the  desire  to  retain  the 
Indian  language  in  the  schools.  The  Seminoles  have  thus  far  established  five 
common  schools,  and  a  missionary  boarding-school,  under  the  charge  of  the 
Presbyterian  Church.  This  little  tribe  is  improving  as  rapidly  in  material 
wealth  and  in  education  as  any  other  in  the  Territory. 

On  the  Canadian  river  is  a  town  which  has  at  various  times  possessed  the 
euphonious  appellations  of  "  Sandtown"  and  "Buzzard's  Roost."  It  is  now 
merely  a  collection  of  roofless  cabins,  but  was  long  the  rendezvous  of  all  the 
ruffians  infesting  the  Territory.  Perched  on  a  waste  near  the  river's  side.,  it  was 
a  convenient  location  for  murder  and  plunder,  and  travelers  learned  to  give  it  a 
wide  berth. 

Passing  Perryville,  an  old  trading-post  of  the  Choctaws,  and  now  a  station  of 
some  promise ;  then  along  the  picturesque  and  fertile  line  of  Ream's  Valley,  a 
magnificent  region ;  dashing  through  the  wonderful  coal  region  near  McAllister, 
we  came  at  last  to  Limestone  Gap. 

From  Limestone  Gap  to  the  Red  river  the  country  is  wonderfully  fertile,  and 
in  summer  beautiful  beyond  description.  Towns  of  more  or  less  promise  are 
interspersed  with  solitudes  which  are  very  impressive.  Stringtown  is  to  be  one 
of  the  lumber  markets  of  the  future ;  and  at  Caddo,  one  of  the  curious  new 
towns  which  are  plenty  in  the  vicinity  of  the  Texan  frontier,  the  Fort  Sill  trade 
debouches,  and  with  the  building  of  a  branch  railway  to  Paris,  the  cotton  from 
that  town  and  other  points  in  Northern  Texas  will  come  in. 

The  railroad  runs  over  trestle-work  of  the  most  difficult  character  between 
A-to-ka  and  South  Boggy,  which  latter  town  was  once  the  capital  of  the 
Choctaw  nation.  Not  far  from  the  banks  of  the  Red  river,  on  the  Indian  side, 
a  small  town  has  grown  up,  and  the  Texas  Central  railroad  will  soon  cause  the 


A     PROFITABLE      FERRY A     GLIMPSE      AT      SOME      IMMIGRANTS. 


213 


growth  of  a  hamlet  on  the  opposite  side.  The  river,  at  the  point  where  it  is 
crossed  by  the  railroad,  on  a  superb  bridge,  is  not  grand,  although  the  banks  are 
high  and  stony.  There  is  usually  but  a  small  volume  of  water  in  the  stream, 
and  the  sands  show  on  either  side. 

Not  far  from  the  railway  bridge  we  saw  a  long  line  of  cattle  fording  the 
channel ;  and  the  answer  to  our  inquiry  as  to  the  reason  why  no  bridge  had  been 
constructed  by  the  Texas  and  Indian  Governments  at  those  points  was  that  a 
Chickasaw  Indian  had  long  ago  secured  legislative  privilege  to  charge  one  dollar 
for  each  person  crossing  the  river  from  either  direction,  at  the  very  point  most 
available  for  bridge-building.     The  income  of  this  Indian  has,  for  some  years, 

been   $100  per   day,  while    the  working   expenses 
of  the  ford  are  not  more  than  $20  weekly. 

As  our  train  lay  in  the  shadow  of  the  hills  at  Lime- 
stone Gap  that  night,  the  express  from  St.  Louis  went 
thundering  by,  and  we  were  awakened  to  catch  a 
glimpse  of  cars  filled  with  weary  emigrants,  their  faces 
eagerly  turned  toward  the  South.  Ere  I  slept  again, 
I  followed  them  in  fancy  on  their  journey  to  the  Gulf. 
Now  they  were  hurried  through  sharply  -  defined 

hill  ranges,  and  deep, 
sequestered,  fertile 
valleys,  until,  the  last 
creek  crossed,  the  last 
forest  of  the  Territory 
dominated,  the  fickle 
stream  that  marks 
the  Texan  boundary 
was  reached;  then,  on 
through  new  forests, 
where  a  gnarled, 
unprofitable  growth 
rankly  asserted  itself ; 

The  Toll -Bridge  at  Limestone  Gap,  Indian  Territory.  J 

y  and    now   over  up- 

lands, whose  black  earth  needs  but  a  caress  to  bring  forth  abundant  harvest. 

Now  through  thickets  where  Spanish  moss  hung  in  hundred  fantastic  forms 
from  the  trees  it  feeds  upon  ;  past  immense  fields,  where  thousands  of  cattle  were 
grazing ;  by  banks  and  braes,  in  summer-time  dotted  and  spangled  with  myriads 
of  flowers ;  along  highways  where  horsemen  rode  merrily.  Now  the  train 
rushed  through  a  still,  old  town,  where  negro  children  were  playing  about  the 
doors  of  the  dirty,  white  houses,  or  a  stalwart  negress,  with  a  huge  bundle  on  her 
head,  was  tramping  in  the  shade  of  friendly  trees ;  and  now  along  the  borders  of 
a  marsh  in  which  a  million  frogs  were  croaking  a  dreary  burden,  their  monoton- 
ous chorus  rising  out  of  little  pools  from  which  the  flag-lily  raised  its  defiant  head. 

Or  now  the  train  stopped  where  one  could  see,  in  the  tremulous  air  of 
evening,  the  reflection  of  the  dying  sun  in  a  little  lake  nestling  among  the  trees, 


214  SCENES     ALONG     THE     IMMIGRANT'S     ROUTE     TO     TEXAS. 

with  Spanish  graybeards  dipping  into  its  clear  depths;  now  where  a  path  wound 
up  a  hill-side,  and  a  magnolia  tree  stood  lonely,  its  green  leaves  giving  promise 
of  future  bloom  and  perfume,  and  its  coarse  bark  sending  forth  a  subtle  odor; 
now  where  sombre  creeks  stole  in  and  out  among  the  crooked  trees,  as  if  eager 
to  furnish  seductive  nooks  for  the  brown,  gray  and  red  birds  which  fluttered  and 
hovered  and  hopped  from  a  thousand  twigs. 

Or  now  where  the  mesquite  quivered  in  the  glare  of  the  generous  Texan 
sun ;  where  the  voices  of  negroes  were  heard  in  loud  refrain,  singing  some  bois- 
terous melody  as  they  loitered  home  from  their  half-completed  tasks,  the  urchins 
somersaulting  on  the  elastic  earth ;  and  now  where  the.  shadows  in  the  distance 
were  strangely  lighted  up  by  the  erratic  glow  of  the  moon,  which  threw  a  fan- 
tastic   glamour   on    moss    and  thicket,   on  lily,  magnolia,  and  live  oak. 


XXI. 


MISSOURI ST.      LOUIS,     PAST     AND     PRESENT. 

MISSOURI  is  the  child  of  a  compromise  whose  epitaph  was  written  in  letters 
of  blood.  Her  chief  city  was  founded  more  than  a  century  ago,  by  a 
colony  of  adventurous  Frenchmen ;  and  for  many  years,  during  whose  lapse  the 
title  to  its  soil  was  savagely  disputed  by  Gaul  and  Indian,  was  a  fur-trading  post 


"Looking  down  on  the  St.  Louis  of  to-day,  from  the  high  roof  of  the  Insurance  temple."       [Page  217.] 


When  Laclede  Liguest  and  the  brave  band  of  men  who  followed  him  set  out 
from  New  Orleans,  in   1763,  to  explore  the  country  whose  exclusive  trade  had 


216 


MISSOURI LACLEDE      LIGUEST's      EXPLORATIONS. 


been  accorded  them  by  charter  from  the  hands  of  the  governor  of  the  province 
of  Louisiana,  the  lands  west  of  the  Mississippi  were  unexplored  and  unknown. 
Beyond  the  mouth  of  the  Missouri  river  the  bateau  of  no  prying  New  Orleans 
trader  had   ever  penetrated.      The  song  of  the  voyageur  was  as  yet  unheard 

by  the  savage ;  and  the  inhabitants  of  the 
little  post  of  Sainte  Genevieve  looked 
with  amazement  and  reverence  upon  the 
trappers,  hunters  and  merchants  who 
started  from  their  fort,  one  autumn 
morning,  to  explore  the  turbid  current 
of  the   Missouri. 

Laclede  Liguest  and  his  men  did 
not  long  remain  in  the  mysterious 
region  adjacent  to  the  junction  of  the 
two  great  rivers,  but  speedily  returned 
to  the  site  of  the  present  city,  and 
there,  early  in  1764,  a  few  humble 
cabins  were  erected,  and  the  new  set- 
tlement was  christened  St.  Louis,  in 
honor  of  the  dissolute  and  feeble  Louis 
XV.,  of  France.  A  hardy  and  fearless 
youth  named  Auguste  Chouteau  was 
left  in  command  of  the  few  men  pro- 

"  Where  now  stands  the  great  stone  Cathedral."    [Page2I7.]      tecting     fte     infant    tOWn,     and     at     Once 

began  negotiating  with  the  Missouri  Indians,  who  came  in  large  bodies  to  visit 
the  strangers,  and  to  learn  their  intentions. 

The  treaty  by  which  all  the  French  territory  on  the  Mississippi's  eastern  bank, 
save  New  Orleans,  was  ceded  to  the  English,  had  just  been  made ;  scarlet- coated 
soldiers  were  daily  expected  at  the  forts  near  St.  Louis.  Laclede  Liguest  did 
not  dream  that  another  cession,  embracing  all  lands  west  of  the  Mississippi,  had 
been  made  to  the  king  of  Spain,  and  that  his  pet  town  was  actually  upon  Spanish 
soil ;  he  was  happy  in  the  belief  that  the  banner  of  France  would  flaunt  in  the 
very  eyes  of  the  hated  English,  and  was  delighted  to  find  that  the  Indians  who 
surrounded  him  were  resolved  to  fight  the  soldiers  of  Great  Britain  to  the  death. 

So  he  merrily  extended  the  limits  of  his  colony ;  but  had  been  at  work  hardly 
a  year  before  he  received  orders  from  the  governor  of  Louisiana  to  surrender  to 
Spain.  The  governor  himself  was  so  chagrined  at  the  orders  he  was  compelled 
to  communicate,  that  he  died  of  a  broken  heart  soon  after;  and  Laclede 
Liguest,  mute  with  rage  at  the  pusillanimous  conduct  of  the  Home  Government, 
remained  stubbornly  at  his  post,  ignoring  Spanish  claims.  The  French  from  all 
the  stations  east  of  the  Mississippi  took  refuge  with  him,  when  the  English  came 
to  their  homes,  and  St.  Louis  grew  more  and  more  Gallic  until  1768,  when  the 
Spanish  came  in,  and  after  several  unsuccessful  attempts  to  gain  the  confidence 
of  the  early  settlers,  finally  quite  disregarded  their  feelings,  and  in  1770  pulled 
down  the  French  flag. 


COLONIAL     DAYS UPPER     LOUISIANA     BECOMES     AMERICAN. 


217 


.  In  that  year  the  French  had  consecrated  their  little  log  church,  built  on  the 
land  where  now  stands  the  great  stone  cathedral,  and  in  that  humble  edifice  they 
assembled  to  mourn  the  loss  of  their  nationality,  and  to  listen  to  the  counsels  of 
peace  given  them  by  their  priests.  The  Spanish  commanders  finally  succeeded 
in  fraternizing  with  the  French,  and  cordially  joined  them  in  hating  the  English. 

Laclede  Liguest  died  during  a  voyage  down  the  Mississippi,  and  was  buried 
in  the  wild  solitudes  at  the  mouth  of  the  Arkansas  river.  His  immense  proper- 
ties in  St  Louis  were  sold  to  strangers.  His  valiant  lieutenant,  Auguste 
Chouteau,  became  his  administrator,  and  a  few  years  afterward  the  Chouteau 
mansion  was  built  in  the  field  where  now  there  is  a  continual  roar  of  traffic. 

Thenceforward,  through  the  bloody  days  of  the  colonial  revolution,  St.  Louis 
experienced  many  vicissitudes.  It  underwent  Indian  massacres ;  suffered  from 
the  terrorism  of  the  banditti  haunting  the  Mississippi ;  began  gradually  to  get 
acquainted  with  the  gaunt  American  pioneers  who  had  appeared  on  the  eastern 
bank  of  the  Father  of  Waters;  and  in  1788  had  more  than  1,000  inhabitants.  In 
those  days  it  was  scoffingly  called  "Pain  Court"  (short  bread),  because  grain 
was  expensive,  and  the  hunters  who  came  to  the  "metropolis"  to  replenish  their 
stock  of  provisions  got  but  scant  allowance  of  bread  for  their  money. 

The  Osages  were  forever  hanging  upon  the  outskirts  of  the  settlement,  and 
many  an  unfortunate  hunter  was  burned  at  the  stake,  impaled,  or  tortured  slowly 
to  death  by  them.  Toward  the  close  of  the  last  century,  however,  the  inhabit- 
ants pushed  forward  into  the  wilderness,  and  the  fur  trade  increased  rapidly. 
Numerous  neat,  one-story  cottages,  surrounded  by  pretty  gardens,  sprang  up  in 
St.  Louis.  France  once  more  recovered  her  possessions  west  of  the  Mississippi ; 
and  in  1804  the  settlement  which  Laclede  Liguest  had  so  carefully  founded,, 
hoping  that  it  might  forever  remain  French,  came  under  the  domination  of  the 
United  States. 

A  formal  surrender  of  Upper  Louisiana  was  made  to  the  newly  enfranchised 
American  colonies;  the  stars  and  stripes  floated  from  the  "Government  House'* 
of  St.  Louis ;  and  the 
Anglo-Saxon  came  to  the 
front,  with  one  hand  ex- 
tended for  a  land  grant, 
and  the  other  grasping  a 
rifle,  with  which  to  exter- 
minate Indian,  Spaniard 
or  demon,  if  they  dared 
to  stand  in  his  way. 

Looking  down  upon 
the  St.  Louis  of  to-day, 
from  the  high  roof  of  the 
superb  temple  which  the 
Missourians  have  built  to 
the  mercurial  god  of  in- 
surance,    One     Can    hardly  The  Old  Chouteau  Mansion  (as  it  was.) 


218 


THE     ST.      LOUIS     OF     TO-DAY. 


The  St.  Louis  Life  Insurance  Company's  Building. 


believe  that  the  vast  metropolis  spread  out  before  him  represents  the  growth 
of  only  three-quarters  .of  a  century.  The  town  seems  as  old  as  London. 
The  smoke  from  the  Illinois  coal  has  tinged  the  walls  a  venerable  brown,  and  the 
grouping  of  buildings  is  as  picturesque  and  varied  as  that  of  a  continental  city. 

From  the  water-side,  on  ridge  after 


ridge,  rise  acres  of  solidly-built  houses, 
vast  manufactories,  magazines  of  com- 
merce, long  avenues  bordered  with 
splendid  residences.  A  labyrinth  of 
railways  bewilders  the  eye ;  and  the 
clang  of  machinery  and  the  whirl  of  a 
myriad  wagon-wheels  rise  to  the  ear. 
The  levee  is  thronged  with  busy  and 
uncouth  laborers ;  dozens  of  white 
steamers  are  shrieking  their  notes  of 
arrival  and  departure ;  the  ferries  are 
choked  with  traffic ;  a  gigantic  and 
grotesque  scramble  for  the  almost  lim- 
itless West  beyond  is  spread  out 
before  one's  vision. 

The  town  has  leaped  into  a  new 
life  since  the  war ;  has  doubled  its  population,  its  manufactures  and  its  ambition, 
and  stands  so  fully  abreast  of  its  wonderful  neighbor,  Chicago,  that  the  tradi- 
tional acerbity  of  the  reciprocal  criticism  for  which  both  cities  have  so  long 
been  famous  is  latterly  much  enhanced. 

The  city  which  now  stretches  twelve  miles  along  the  ridges  branching  from 
the  water-shed  between  the  Missouri,  the  Meramec  and  the  Mississippi  rivers, 
flanked  by  rolling  prairies  richly  studded  with  groves  and  vineyards ;  which  has 
thirty  railroad  lines  pointed  to  its  central  depots,  and  a  mile  and  a-half  of  steam- 
boats at  its  levee,  1,000  miles  from  the  sea;  whose  population  has  increased  from 
8,000,  in  1835,  t°  450,000,  in  1874;  which  has  a  banking  capital  of  $  1 9,000,000 ; 
which  receives  hundreds  of  thousands 
of  tons  of  iron  ore  monthly,  has 
bridged  the  Father  of  Waters,  and 
talks  of  controlling  the  cotton  trade 
of  Arkansas  and  Texas — is  a  giant 
in  comparison  with  the  infant  settle- 
ment wherein,  in  a  rude  cottage, 
Colonel  Stoddard  had  his  head-quar- 
ters when  the  United  States  assumed 
territorial  jurisdiction.  In  those  days 
the  houses  were  nearly  all  built  of 
hewn  logs,  set  upon  end,  and  covered 
with     coarsely    shingled    roofs.      The 

tOWn  then   extended   along  the    line    Of       "  In  those  days  the  houses  were  nearly  all  built  of  hewn  logs." 


OLD     ST.     LOUIS  —  PROGRESS     SINCE     THE     LATE     WAR.  219 

what  are  now  known  as  Main  and  Second  streets ;  a  little  south  of  the  square 
called  the  Place  d'Armes,  Fort  St.  Charles  was  held  by  a  small  garrison,  and  in 
the  old  stone  tower  which  the  Spaniards  had  built,  debtors  and  criminals  were 
confined  together. 

French  customs  and  French  gayety  prevailed ;  there  were  two  diminutive 
taverns,  whose  rafters  nightly  rang  to  the  tales  of  hair-breadth  escapes  told  by 
the  boatmen  of  the  Mississippi.  The  Chouteaus,  the  Lisas,  and  the  Labbadies 
were  the  principal  merchants ;  French  and  English  schools  flourished ;  peltry, 
lead  and  whiskey  were  used  for  currency,  and  negroes  were  to  be  purchased  for 
them  ;  the  semi- Indian  garb  of  the  trapper  was  seen  at  every  street  corner ;  and 
thousands  of  furs,  stripped  from  the  buffalo  and  the  beaver,  were  exported  to  New 
Orleans.  The  mineral  wealth  lying  within  a  hundred  miles  of  St.  Louis  had 
hardly  been  dreamed  of;  the  colonists  were  too  busy  in  killing  Indians  and 
keeping  order  in  the  town,  to  think  of  iron,  lead,  coal  and  zinc. 

The  compromise  which  gave  the  domain  of  Missouri  to  slavery  checked  the 
growth  of  the  State  until  after  it  had  passed  through  the  ordeal  of  the  war. 
How  then  it  sprang  up,  like  a  young  giant,  confident  of  the  plenitude  of  its 
strength,  all  the  world  knows !  St.  Louis,  under  free  institutions,  has  won  more 
prosperity  in  ten  years  than  under  the  old  regime  it  would  have  attained  in  fifty. 

It  is  now  a  cosmopolitan  capital,  rich  in  social  life  and  energy,  active  in  com- 
merce, and  acute  in  the  struggle  for  the  supremacy  of  trade  in  the  South-west. 
The  ante-bellum  spirit  is  rarely  manifested  now-a-days ;  progress  is  the  motto 
even  of  those  men  of  the  old  school  who  prayed  that  they  might  die  when  they 
first  saw  that  "  bleeding  Kansas"  had  indeed  bled  to  some  purpose,  and  that  a 
new  era  of  trade  and  labor  had  arrived.  The  term  "  conservative"  is  one  of 
reproach  in  St.  Louis  to-day ;  and  the  unjust  slur  of  the  Chicagoan,  to  the  effect 
that  the  Missouri  metropolis  is  "  slow,"  puts  new  fire  into  the  blood  of  her  every 
inhabitant. 

After  the  ravages  of  the  war,  both  State  and  city  found  themselves  free  from 
the  major  evils  attendant  upon  reconstruction,  and  entered  unimpeded  upon  a 
prosperous  career.  The  100,000  freedmen  have  never  constituted  a  troublesome 
element  in  the  State ;  no  political  exigencies  have  impeded  immigration  or 
checked  the  investment  of  capital ;  and  the  commonwealth,  with  an  area  of  more 
than  67,000  square  miles  of  fertile  lands,  with  2,000,000  of  inhabitants,  and 
$1,100,000,000  worth  of  taxable  property;  with  1,000  miles  of  navigable  rivers 
within  her  territory  and  upon  her  boundaries,  and  with  vast  numbers  of  frugal 
Germans  constantly  coming  to  turn  her  untilled  acres  into  rich  farms,  can  safely 
carry  and  in  due  time  throw  off  the  various  heavy  obligations  incurred  in  the 
building  of  the  railway  lines  now  traversing  it  in  every  direction.  The  present 
actual  indebtedness  of  the  State  is  nearly  $19,000,000,  for  more  than  half  of 
which  suni  bonds  have  been  issued. 

The  approaches  to  St.  Louis  from  the  Illinois  side  of  the  Mississippi  are  not 
fascinating,  and  give  but  a  poor  idea  of  the  extent  of  the  city.  Alighting  from 
some  one  of  the  many  trains  which  enter  East  St.  Louis  from  almost  every 
direction,  one  sees  before  him  a  steep  bank  paved  with  "  murderous  stones,"  and 


220 


EAST     ST.      LOUIS SCENES     ON     THE     LEVEE. 


the  broad,  deep,  resistless  current  of  the  great  river,  bearing  on  its  bosom  tree 
trunks  and  branches  from  far-away  forests. 

East  St.  Louis  stands  upon  famous  ground ;  its  alluvial  acres,  which  the 
capricious  stream  in  past  times  yearly  overflowed,  have  been  the  scene  of  many 
fierce  contests  under  the  requirements  of  the  so-called  code  of  honor,  and  its 
sobriquet  was  once  "Bloody  Island."  It  is  now  a  prosperous  town;  hotels, 
warehouses  and  depots  stand  on  the  ancient  dueling  ground ;  immense  grain 
elevators  and  wharves  have  been  erected  on  soil  which  the  river  once  claimed  as 
its  own.  Huge  ferry-boats  ply  constantly  across  the  river;  but  the  railway 
omnibuses  and  the  ferry-boats  are  soon  to  be  but  memories  of  the  past,  as  the 
graceful  arches  of  the  new  bridge  testify.  • 


"The  crowd  awaiting  transportation  across  the  stream  has  always  been  of  the  most  cosmopolitan  and  motley  character, 


The  crowd  awaiting  transportation  across  the  stream  has  always  been  of  the 
most  cosmopolitan  and  motley  character.  There  may  be  seen  the  German  emi- 
grant, flat-capped  and  dressed  in  coarse  black,  with  his  quaintly  attired  wife  and 
rosy  chilnren  clinging  to  him;  the  tall  and  angular  Texan  drover,  with  his  defiant 
glance  at  the  primly  dressed  cockneys  around  him;  the  "poor  white"  from  some 


THE      RIVER-SIDE     PANORAMA.  221 

far  Southern  State,  with  his  rifle  grasped  in  his  lean  hand,  and  his  astonished 
stare  at  the  extent  of  brick  and  stone  walls  beyond  the  river ;  the  excursion  party 
from  the  East,  with  its  maps  and  guide-books,  and  its  mountains  of  baggage ;  the 
little  groups  of  English  tourists,  with  their  mysterious  hampers  and  packets, 
bound  toward  Denver  or  Omaha ;  the  tired  and  ill-uniformed  company  of  troops 
"  on  transfer  "  to  some  remote  frontier  fortress ;  the  smart  merchant  in  his  car- 
riage, with  his  elegantly  dressed  negro  driver  standing  by  the  restive  horses ;  the 
hordes  of  over-clothed  young  commercial  men  from  the  Northern  and  Western 
cities,  with  their  mouths  distended  by  Havana  cigars,  and  filled  with  the  slang  of 
half-a-dozen  capitals ;  and  the  hundreds  of  negroes,  who  throng  the  levees  in 
summer,  departing  in  winter  like  the  swallows,  at  the  slightest  hint  of  snow,  or  of 
the  fog  which  from  time  to  time  heightens  the  resemblance  of  the  Missouri 
capital  to  London. 

Before  the  bridge  was  built,  the  levee  on  each  side  of  the  river  was  a  kind  of 
pandemonium.  An  unending  procession  of  wagons,  loaded  with  coal,  was  always 
forcing  its  way  from  the  ferry-boats  up  the  bank  to  the  streets  of  St.  Louis,  the 
tatterdemalion  drivers  urging  on  the  plunging  and  kicking  mules  with  frantic 
shouts  of  "  Look  at  ye!"  "You  dar!"  These  wagons,  in  busy  days,  were  con- 
stantly surrounded  by  the  incoming  droves  of  stock,  wild  Texan  cattle,  that  with 
great  leaps  and  nourish  of  horns  objected  to  entering  the  gangways  of  the  ferry, 
and  now  and  then  tossed  their  tormentors  high  in  the  air ;  and  troops  of  swine, 
bespattered  with  mud,  and  dabbled  with  blood  drawn  from  them  by  the  thrusts 
of  the  enraged  horsemen  pursuing  them.  Added  to  this  indescribable  tumult 
were  the  lumbering  wagon-trains  laden  with  iron  or  copper,  wearily  making  their 
way  to  the  boats;  the  loungers  about  the  curbstones  singing  rude  plantation 
songs,  or  scuffling  boisterously ;  the  nameless  ebb-tide  of  immigration  scattered 
through  a  host  of  low  and  villainous  bar-rooms  and  saloons,  whose  very  entrances 
seemed  suspicious ;  and  the  gangs  of  roustabouts  rolling  boxes,  barrels,  hogs- 
heads, and  bales,  from  wagon  to  wharf,  and  from  wharf  to  wagon,  from  morning 
to  night. 

Below  the  bridge,  the  river,  gradually  broadening  out,  was  covered  with 
coal-barges  and  steam-tugs,  and  above  it,  along  the  banks,  one  saw,  as  one  still 
sees,  dark  masses  of  homely  buildings,  elevators,  iron  foundries,  and  various 
manufactories ;  while  along  the  shore  are  moored  thousands  of  logs,  fastened 
together  in  rafts. 


XXII. 


ST.     LOUIS     GERMANS    AND    AMERICANS— SPECULATIVE 
PHILOSOPHY— EDUCATION. 

rpHE  old  French  quarter  of  St.  Louis  is  now  entirely  given  up  to  business, 
A  and  but  little  of  the  Gallic  element  is  left  in  the  town.  Some  of  the 
oldest  and  wealthiest  families  are  of  French  descent,  and  retain  the  language 
and  manners  of  their  ancestors;  but  there  are  few  exterior  traces  of  French 
domination.  Souvenirs  still  remain;  streets,  both  English  and  American  in 
aspect  bear  the  names  of  the  vanished  Gauls.  Laclede  has  a  monument  in  the 
form  of  a  mammoth  hotel ;  and  the  principal  outlying  ward  of  the  city,  crowded 

with  vast  rolling-mills,  and  iron 
and  zinc-furnaces,  is  called  Carondelet. 
On  the  Illinois  side  of  the  river  the 
village  of  Cahokia  still  lingers,  a  moss- 
grown  relic  of  a  decayed  civilization, 
its  venerable  church,  Notre  Dame  des 
Kahokias,  being  the  most  ancient 
building  in  the  West.  But  not  one  of 
the  great  circular  stone  towers,  erected 
in  early  times  as  defences  against  the 
Indians,  remain;  block-houses  and 
bastions  have  been  replaced  by  mas- 
sive residences,  in  which  live  the 
merchant  princes  of  the  day. 

"The  Hill"  is  traversed  in  every 
direction  by  horse  railroads;  and  a  few 

1  he  Court -House— St.  Louis.  „•  >       -i  -n 

minutes    ride  will  take  one  from  the 
roar  of  business  into    a  quiet  and    elegant   section,  where  there  are  miles   of 
beautiful  and  costly  dwellings.     As   the  ridges  rise  from  the  river,  so  rise  the 
grades  of  social  status.       Mingled  with    the  wholesale  establishments,  and  the 
omces  of  mining  and  railway  companies  in  Main  and  Second  streets    parallel 
H  f  fY1Ver'  are  hundreds  of  dirty  and  unhealthy  tenement  houses;  on  Fourth 
and  Fifth,  and  Sixth  streets,  and  on  those  running  at  right  angles  with  them  are 
the  principal  hotels,  the  more  elegant  of  the  shops  and  stores,  the  fashionable    ' 
restaurants,  and  the  few  places  of  amusement  which  the  city  boasts;  %yond   on 
the  upper  ridges,  stretching  back  to  Grand  avenue,  which  extends  along  'the 
summit  of  the  hill,  are  the  homes  of  the  wealthy. 

The  passion  for  suburban  residences  is  fast  taking  possession  of  the  citizens  of 
St.  Louis,  and  several  beautiful  towns  have  sprung  up  within  a  few  miles  of  the 


STREET      LIFE      IN     ST.      LOUIS. 


223 


city,  all  of  which  are  crowded  with  charming  country  houses.  Lucas  Place 
is  the  Fifth  avenue  of  St.  Louis,  and  is  very  rich  in  costly  homes  surrounded  by 
noble  gardens.  The  houses  there  have  not  been  touched  by  the  almost  omni- 
present smoke  which  seems  to  hover  over  the  lower  portion  of  the  town.     In 

Lucas  Place  lived  the  noted  Benton, 
and  there  he  foamed,  fretted,  planned 
his  duels,  nourished  his  feuds,  and 
matured  his  magnificent  ideas.  The 
avenues  which  bear  the  names  of 
Washington,  Franklin,  Lindell, "  Mc- 
Pherson,  Baker,  Laclede  and  Chouteau 
all  give  promise  of  future  magnificence. 
St.  Louis  is  not  rich  in  public 
buildings,  although  many  of  the  recent 
structures  devoted  to  business  are 
grand  and  imposing.  The  hotels 
partake  of  the  grandeur  which  dis- 
tinguishes their  counterparts  of  other 
cities;  on  Fourth  and  Fifth  streets 
there  are  many  elegant  blocks. 

The  street  life  is  varied  and  at- 
tractive, as  in  most  southern  towns  ; 
and  the  auction  store  is  one  of  the 
salient  features  which  surprise  a 
stranger.  The  doors  of  these  estab- 
lishments are  open  from  sunrise  until  midnight,  and  the  jargon  of  the  auctioneer 
can  be  heard  ringing  loudly  above  the  rattle  of  wheels.  The  genius  who 
presides  behind  the  counter  is  usually  some  graduate  of  the  commerce  of  the 
far  South.  Accustomed  to  dealing  with  the  ignorant  and  unsuspecting,  his 
eloquence  is  a  curious  compound  of  insolence  and  pleading.  He  has  a 
quaint  stock  of  phrases,  made  up  of  the  slang  of  the  river  and  the  slums  of 
cities,  and  he  begins  by  placing  an  extravagant  price  upon  the  article  which  he 
wishes  to  sell,  and  then  decreasing  its  value  until  he  brings  it  down  to  the  range 
of  his  customers. 

On  Saturday  evenings  the  street  life  is  as  animated  as  that  of  an  European 
city.  In  the  populous  quarters  the  Irish  and  Germans  throng  the  sidewalks, 
marketing  and  amusing  themselves  until  midnight ;  and  in  the  fashionable  sec- 
tions the  ladies,  seated  in  the  porches  and  on  the  front  door-steps  of  their  man- 
sions, receive  the  visits  of  their  friends. 

A  drive  through  dozens  of  streets  in  the  upper  portion  of  the  city  discloses 
hundreds  of  groups  of  ladies  and  gentlemen  thus  seated  in  the  open  air,  whither 
they  have  transferred  the  etiquette  of  the  parlor.  A  far  more  delightful  and 
agreeable  social  freedom  prevails  in  the  city  than  in  any  Eastern  community.  The 
stranger  is  heartily  welcome,  and  the  fact  that  most  of  the  ladies  have  been 
educated  both  in  the  East  and  the  West,  acquiring  the  culture  of  the  former 
15 


Thomas  H.  Benton  (for  thirty  years  United  States 
Senator  from  Missouri). 


224  THE     GERMAN     ELEMENT. 

and  the  frankness  and  cordiality  of  the  latter,  adds  a  charm  both  to  their  con- 
versation and  their  beauty. 

At  the  more  aristocratic  and  elegant  of  the  German  beer  gardens,  such  as 
"  Uhrig's  "  and  "  Schneider's,"  the  representatives  of  many  prominent  American 
families  may  be  seen  on  the  concert  evenings,  drinking  the  amber  fluid,  and 
listening  to  the  music  of  Strauss,  of  Gungl,  or  Meyerbeer.  Groups  of  elegantly 
dressed  ladies  and  gentlemen  resort  to  the  gardens  in  the  same  manner  as  do  the 
denizens  of  Dresden  and  Berlin,  and  no  longer  regard  the  custom  as  a  dangerous 
German  innovation. 

The  German  element  in  St.  Louis  is  powerful,  and  has  for  the  last  thirty 
years  been  merging  in  the  American,  giving  to  it  many  of  the  hearty  features 
and  graces  of  European  life,  which  have  been  emphatically  rejected  by  the 
native  population  of  the  more  austere  Eastern  States.  In  like  manner  the  Ger- 
man has  borrowed  many  traits  from  his  American  fellow- citizens,  and  in  another 
generation  the  fusion  of  races  will  be  pretty  thoroughly  accomplished. 

There  are  more  than  fifty  thousand  native  Germans  now  in  St.  Louis,  and  the 
whole  Teutonic  population,  including  the  children  born  in  the  city  of  German 
parents,  probably  exceeds  one  hundred  and  fifty  thousand.  The  original 
emigration  from  Germany  to  Missouri  was  largely  from  the  thinking  classes — 
professional  men,  politicians  condemned  to  exile,  writers,  musicians,  and  philoso- 
phers, and  these  have  aided  immensely  in  the  development  of  the  State. 

The  emigration  began  in  1830,  but  after  a  few  hundreds  had  come  out  it  fell 
off  again,  and  was  not  revived  until  1848,  when  the  revolution  sent  us  a  new 
crop  of  patriots  and  statesmen,  whose  mother  country  was  afraid  of  them. 
Always  a  loyal  and  industrious  element,  believing  in  the  whole  country,  and  in 
the  principles  of  freedom,  they  kept  Missouri,  in  the  troublous  times  preceding 
and  during  the  war,  from  many  excesses. 

The  working  people  are  a  treasure  to  the  State.  Arriving,  as  a  rule,  with 
little  or  nothing,  they  hoard  every  penny  until  they  have  enough  with  which  to 
purchase  an  acre  or  two  of  land,  and  in  a  few  years  become  well-to-do  citizens, 
orderly  and  contented.  The  whole  country  for  miles  around  St.  Louis  is  dotted 
with  German  settlements ;  the  market  gardens  are  mainly  controlled  by  them ; 
and  their  farms  are  models  of  thorough  cultivation. 

v  In  commerce  they  have  mingled  liberally  with  the  Americans;  names  of  both 
nationalities  are  allied  in  banking  and  in  all  the  great  wholesale  businesses ;  and 
the  older  German  residents  speak  their  adopted  as  well  as  their  native  tongue. 
At  the  time  of  my  visit,  a  German  was  president  of  the  city  council,  and  bank 
presidents,  directors  of  companies,  and  men  highly  distinguished  in  business  and 
society,  who  boast  German  descent,  are  counted  by  hundreds. 

German  journalism  in  St.  Louis  is  noteworthy.  Carl  Schurz  and  his  life-long 
friend  and  present  partner,  Mr.  Pretorius,  are  known  throughout  the  country  as 
distinguished  journalists,  and  have  even,  as  we  have  seen  in  these  later  days, 
played  no  small  role  upon  the  stage  of  national  politics. 

The  failure  of  the  Liberal  Republican  movement  rather  astonished  the  masses 
of  the  Germans  in  Missouri,  who  had  the  most  unwavering  confidence  in  the 


GERMAN      SOCIAL      LIFE THE     OPERA BREWERIES.  225 

ability  of  Schurz  to  accomplish  whatever  he  chose ;  and  has  left  them  somewhat 
undecided  as  to  what  course  to  pursue  in  future.  There  are  four  daily  German 
newspapers  in  St.  Louis,  one  of  which  has  been  recently  planted  there  by  the 
Catholics,  who  have  also  started  a  clever  weekly,  in  the  hope  of  aiding  in  the  fight 
against  the  new  principles  put  in  force  by  the  Prussian  Government — principles, 
of  course,  largely  reflected  among  the  Germans  in  America.  The  sturdy  intel- 
lectual life  of  the  Teuton  is  well  set  forth  in  these  papers,  which  are  of  great  ability. 

The  uselessness  of  the  attempt  to  maintain  a  separate  national  feeling  was 
shown  in  the  case  of  the  famous  "Germania"  Club,  which,  in  starting,  had  for  its 
cardinal  principle  the  non-admission  of  Americans  ;  but  at  the  present  time  there 
are  200  American  names  upon  its  list  of  membership.  The  assimilation  goes  on 
even  more  rapidly  than  the  Germans  themselves  suppose ;  it  is  apparent  in  the 
manners  of  the  children,  and  in  the  speech  of  the  elders. 

German  social  and  home  life  has,  of  course,  kept  much  of  its  original  flavor. 
There  are  whole  sections  of  the  city  where  the  Teuton  predominates,  and  takes 
his  ease  at  evening  in  the  beer  garden  and  the  arbor  in  his  own  yard.  At  the 
summer  opera  one  sees  him  in  his  glory. 

Entering  a  modest  door- way  on  Fourth  street,  one  is  ushered  through  a  long 
room,  in  which  ladies,  with  their  children,  and  groups  of  elegantly  dressed  men 
are  chatting  and  drinking  beer,  into  the  opera-house,  a  cheery  little  hall,  where 
very  fashionable  audiences  assemble  to  hear  the  new  and  old  operas  throughout 
a  long  season.  The  singing  is  usually  exceedingly  good,  and  the  mise  en  scene 
quite  satisfactory.  Between  the  acts  the  audience  refreshes  itself  with  beer  and 
soda-water,  and  the  hum  of  conversation  lasts  until  the  first  notes  of  the  orchestra 
announce  the  resumption  of  the  opera.  On  Sunday  evenings  the  opera-house  is 
crowded,  and  at  the  long  windows  of  the  hall,  which  descend  to  the  ground,  one 
can  see  the  German  population  of  half-a-dozen  adjacent  blocks,  tiptoe  with 
delight  at  the  whiff  of  stolen  harmony. 

The  "breweries"  scattered  through  the  city  are  gigantic  establishments,  for 
the  making  of  beer  ranks  third  in  the  productive  industries  of  St.  Louis.  Iron 
and  flour  precede  it,  but  a  capital  of  nearly  $4,000,000  is  invested  in  the  manu- 
facture, and  the  annual  productive  yield  from  the  twenty-five  breweries  is  about 
the  same  amount.  Attached  to  many  of  these  breweries  are  concert  gardens, 
every  way  scrupulously  respectable,  and  weekly  frequented  by  thousands. 

The  Germania  and  Harmony  Clubs,  and  a  hundred  musical  and  literary 
organizations  use  up  the  time  of  the  city  Germans  who  are  well-to-do,  while 
their  poorer  brethren  delve  at  market  gardens,  and  are  one  of  the  chief  elements 
in  the  commerce  of  the  immense  and  picturesque  St.  James  Market,  whither  St. 
Louis  goes  to  be  fed.  The  Irishman  is  also  prominent  in  St.  Louis,  having  crept 
into  the  hotel  service,  and  driven  the  negro  to  another  field. 

The  operation  of  the  German  upon  the  American  mind  has  been  admirably 
exemplified  in  St.  Louis  by  the  growth  of  a  real  and  noteworthy  school  of 
speculative  philosophy  in  the  new  and  thoroughly  commercial  capital,  at  whose 
head,  and  by  virtue  of  his  distinguished  preeminence  as  a  thinker,  stands  William 
T.  Harris,  the  present  superintendent  of  the   city  public  schools.     Mr.  Harris, 


226 


WILLIAM     T.      HARRIS  —  SPECULATIVE     PHILOSOPHY. 


during  his  stay  at  Yale,  in  1856,  met  the  venerable  Alcott,  of  Concord,  and  was 
much  stimulated  by  various  conversations  with  him.  At  that  time  he  had 
studied  Kant  a  little,  and  was  beginning  to  think  upon  Goethe. 

The  hints  given  him  by  Mr.  Alcott  were  valuable,  and  some  time  afterward, 
when  he  settled  in  St.  Louis,  and  came  into  contact  with  Germans  of  culture  and 
originality,  his  desire  for  philosophical  study  was  greatly  increased  and  strength- 
ened. In  1858  he  became  engaged  in  teaching,  for  eight  years  conducting  one 
of  the  city  graded  schools. 

The  first  year  of  his  stay  in  St.  Louis  he  studied  Kant's  "  Critique  of  Pure 
Reason,"  without,  as  he  says,  understanding  it  at  all.  He  had  been  solicited  and 
encouraged  to  these  studies  by  Henry  C.  Brockmeyer,  a  remarkable  and  brilliant 
German,  and  so  enthusiastic  for  Kantian  study  that  he  awoke  a  genuine  fervor 
in  Mr.  Harris.  They  arranged  a  Kant  class,  which  Mr.  Alcott  on  one  occasion 
visited,  and  in  a  short  time  the   love   for  philosophical  study  became   almost 


fanaticism.  A  num- 
ber of  highly  cul- 
tured Germans  and 
Americans  com- 
posed the  circle, 
whose  members  had 
a  supreme  contempt 
for  the  needs  of  the 
flesh,  and  who,  after 
long  days  of  labo- 
rious and  exhaustive 
teaching,  would 
spend  the  night 
hours  in  threading 
the  mysteries  of 
Kant.  In  1858  Mr. 
Harris    claims    that 


William  T.  Harris,  editor  of  the  St.  Louis 
Speculative   Philosophy." 


'Journal  of 


they  mastered  Kant, 
and  between  that 
period  and  1863 
they  analyzed,  or,  as 
he  phrases  it,  ob- 
tained the  keys 
to  Leibnitz  and 
Spinoza.  The  result 
of  this  long  study 
is  written  out  in 
what  Mr.  Harris 
calls  his  "  Introduc- 
tion to  Philosophy,'* 
in  which  he  deals 
with  "speculative 
insights."  Every 
one,  he  claims,   will 


have  the  same  insight  into  Kant.  Leibnitz  and  Spinoza  as  he  did,  by  reading  his 
"Introduction."  He  already  has  a  large  number  of  followers,  many  of  whom, 
according  to  his  confession,  apply  his  theories  better  than  he  does  himself:  and 
his  Journal  of  Speculative  Philosophy,  started  boldly  in  the  face  of  many 
obstacles,  has  won  a  permanent  establishment  and  gratifying  success. 

Among  the  most  prominent  members  of  the  Philosophical  Society,  definitely 
organized  in  1864,  were  Mr.  Brockmeyer,  J.  G.  Werner,  now  a  probate  judge, 
Mr.  Kroeger  (a  stern,  unrelenting  philosopher,  enamored  of  Fichte,  translator  of 
the  "Science  of  Knowledge,"  and  author  of  a  "History  of  the  Minnesingers"), 
George  H.  Howison,  now  in  the  Boston  Institute  of  Technology,  and  Mr.  Thomas 
Davidson,  one  of  the  most  profound  students  of  Aristotle  in  this  country.  Mr. 
Brockmeyer  is  the  accomplished  translator  of  Hegel's  "Logic." 

The  Journal  of  Speculative  Philosophy  was  prompted  in  this  wise :  Mr. 
Harris  wrote  a  "  Critique  upon   Herbert  Spencer's   First  Principles,"  which  was 


THE     PUBLIC     SCHOOLS     OF     ST.      LOUIS.  -227 

•offered  to  The  North  American  Review,  but  the  editors  failed  to  discover  any- 
thing in  it  save  that  it  was  very  audacious,  and  returned  it  to  the  author.  Mr. 
Harris  thereupon  boldly  started  his  own  journal  in  April  of  1867.  The  publica- 
tion is  gaining  ground  in  this  country,  and  has  won  a  very  wide  and  hearty 
recognition  in  Germany  and  among  thinking  men  throughout  Europe. 

Mr.  Harris  has  been  an  indefatigable  worker,  as  well  as  a  deep  thinker,  for  a 
score  of  years.  The  impetus  given  by  him  and  his  confreres  to  the  growth  of  a 
deep  and  pure  literature  in  the  West  and  South  is  as  yet  too  little  appreciated. 
A  brilliant  talker,  a  man  of  great  originality,  and  of  positive  genius  for  analysis, 
he  is  fitted  to  shine  in  the  brightest  of  the  world's  capitals,  but  loves  his  South- 
western home,  and  will  doubtless  remain  in  it.  The  teachers  grouped  around 
him  in  his  work  of  directing  the  schools  of  the  new  metropolis  are  brilliant  men 
and  women,  thoroughly  in  love  with  their  work,  and  animated  by  his  inspiring 
presence  with  the  proper  spirit. 

The  Germans  have,  as  a  rule,  frankly  joined  hands  with  the  Americans  in  the 
public  schools,  and  have  imparted  to  them  many  excellent  features.  The  compo- 
site system  differs  largely  from  that  in  vogue  in  other  cities.  There  is,  of  course, 
a  very  large  Catholic  population  in  St.  Louis,  but  it  is  pretty  evenly  balanced  by 
German  skepticism. 

The  city  public  schools  are  utterly  secular  in  their  teaching,  but,  notwith- 
standing that  fact,  the  priesthood  makes  constant  and  successful  efforts  to  keep 
Catholic  children  from  them ;  and  wherever  a  new  public  school  building  is 
erected,  Holy  Church  speedily  buys  ground  and  sets  up  an  institution  of  her 
own.  The  Catholic  laity  of  St.  Louis,  however,  are,  perhaps,  if  they  spoke  their 
real  sentiments,  in  favor  of  the  public  schools;  and  there  has  been  a  vast  advance 
toward  liberalism  on  their  part  within  the  last  few  years.  The  Catholics  have 
eight  or  nine  out  of  the  twenty-four  members  of  the  school  board,  and  of  course 
have  much  to  say. 

It  is  wonderful  that  in  a  capital  where  the  population  is  so  little  gregarious, 
and  where,  up  to  last  year,  it  has  been  so  comparatively  indifferent  to  lecture 
courses,  such  an  earnest  interest  should  be  taken  in  the  schools  by  all  classes. 
All  the  powers  relating  to  the  management  of  the  schools  are  vested  in  a  corpo- 
rate body  called  "  the  Board  of  President  and  Directors  of  the  St.  Louis  Public 
Schools,"  the  members  of  the  board  to  be  elected  for  terms  of  three  years.  The 
school  revenue  is  derived  from  rents  of  property  originally  donated  by  the  Gene- 
ral Government,  by  the  State  school  fund,  and  from  taxes  of  four  mills  on  the 
dollar  on  city  property,  the  yearly  income  from  these  sources  averaging 
perhaps  $700,000.     The  school  board  has  authority  to  tax  to  any  amount. 

Between  the  district  and  the  high  schools  there  is  a  period  of  seven  years, 
during  which  the  pupil  acquires  a  symmetrical  development  admirably  fitting 
him  for  the  solid  instruction  which  the  finishing  school  can  offer.  But  out  of 
forty  thousand  children  enrolled  upon  the  public  school  list,  only  about  two  and 
a-half  per  cent,  enter  the  high  school.  The  feature  of  German-English  instruc- 
tion has  become  exceedingly  popular,  and  the  number  of  pupils  belonging  to  the 
classes  increased  from  450  in    1864-65,  to   10,246  in    1871-72.     The  phonetic 


228 


GROWTH      OF     SCHOOLS CATHOLIC     PROGRESS. 


system  of  learning  to  read  was  introduced  in  the  primary  schools  in  1866,  and 
has  been  attended  with  the  most  gratifying  results. 

The  city  acted  wisely  in  introducing  the  study  of  German,  as  otherwise  the 
Teutonic  citizen  would  doubtless  have  been  tempted  to  send  his  child  to  a 
private  school  during  his  early  years.  Now  native  American  children  take  up 
German  reading  and  oral  lessons  at  the  same  time  as  their  little  German  fellow- 
scholars;  and  in  the  high  school  special  stress  is  laid  upon  German  instruction 
in  the  higher  grades,  that  the  pupils  may  be  fitted  for  a  thorough  examination 
of  German  science  and  literature. 

The  growth  of  St.  Louis  is  so  rapid  that  the  school  board  has  been  compelled 
to  build  several  large  new  school  buildings  annually,  each  capable  of  containing 
from  seven  to  eight  hundred  pupils.     The  introduction  of  natural  science  into  the 

district  schools  is  indicative  of  liberal 
progress.  Normal  schools  in  St.  Louis 
and  at  Kirksville  and  Warrensburg  are 
annually  equipping  splendid  corps  of 
teachers.  The  public  school  system 
throughout  the  State  is  exceedingly 
popular,  judging  from  the  fact  that  a 
quarter  of  a  million  of  children  attend 
the  schools  during  the  sessions. 

The  State  fund  appropriated  to 
school  purposes  is  usually  large,  and 
although  there  have  been  objections  to 
local  taxation  for  school  support  in 
some  of  the  counties,  the  taxes  have 
generally  been  promptly  paid.  The 
largest  and  finest  edifices  in  such 
flourishing  cities  as  St.  Joseph,  Kansas 
City,  Sedalia,  Clinton,  Springfield, 
Mexico,  Louisiana,  and  Booneville  are 
usually  the  " school- houses  ;"  and  in 
Kansas  City,  which  was  without  railroad  communication  in  1865,  the  school  build- 
ings are  now  as  complete,  elegant,  and  large  as  any  in  Boston  or  Chicago.  The 
School  of  Design  in  St.  Louis,  conducted  by  Mr.  Conrad  Diehl,  is  rapidly  growing, 
and  has  already  won  enviable  praise  in  the  most  cultured  art  circles  of  the  East. 
The  Catholic  population  within  the  archdiocese  of  St.  Louis  is  certainly  very 
large,  probably  numbering  two  hundred  thousand  persons ;  and  from  this  popula- 
tion at  least  twenty-five  thousand  children  are  furnished  to  the  one  hundred 
parish  schools  attached  to  the  various  churches  in  the  diocese.  None  of  these 
schools  receive  any  aid  from  the  common  school  fund,  and  the  pupils  are  in 
every  way  removed  from  the  influences  of  secular  education,  and  made  a  class  by 
themselves. 

It  is  estimated  that  the  Catholics  now  own  more  than  four  million  dollars' 
worth  of  church  and  school  property  in  Missouri;  and  in  their  various  colleges, 


The  High  School— St  Louis. 


UNIVERSITIES      IN      THE      STATE. 


229 


convents,  seminaries,  and  academies  in  St.  Louis  and  the  other  large  cities  of  the 

State  they  have  at  least  fifteen  hundred  students.      They  have  kept  well  abreast 

of  the  tide  of  secular  education,  and  bid  it  open  defiance  on  all  occasions,  while 

the  skeptical  and  easy-going  German 

laughs    at    their     zealotry,    and    the  ^   ^ 

American    shuts    his    eyes    to    their  -         "  Jt    _ 

growing  power. 

Vast  as  is  the  growth  of  colleges 
and  schools  of  various  other  denom- 
inations, such  as  the  Baptist,  the 
Methodist,  and  the  Methodist  Epis- 
copal Church  South,  the  Catholics 
keep  even  with  them  all.  Ever  since 
old  Gribault,  the  first  pastor  in  St. 
Louis,  led  his  little  flock  of  five 
hundred  Frenchmen  to  the  altar, 
Mother  Church  has  been  bold,  domi- 
nant, defiant  in  the  young  capital  of 
the  West. 

In  £>t.  Louis  I  was  especially  in- 
terested in  "Washington  University,"  Washington  University—  St    Louis. 

conducted  by  Rev.  Dr.  Eliot,  so  long  pastor  of  the  First  Unitarian  Church  in  that 
city.  The  institution  has  had  a  superb  growth  since  its  founding  in  1853-54, 
despite  the  unfortunate  intervention  of  the  war,  and  now  has  more  than  eight 
hundred  students  in  its  various  branches.  Nourished  by  generous  gifts  from  the 
East,  it  has  made  great  progress  in  its  departments  of  civil  and  mechanical 
engineering,  mining  and  metallurgy,  and  architecture,  and  its  law  department  is 
ably  supported. 

To  that  section  of  the  University  devoted  to  the  special  education  of  women, 
known  as  "  Mary  Institute,"  the  flower  of  Missourian  girlhood  annually  repairs. 
The  University  seems  to  have  had  an  almost  mushroom  growth;  yet  its  culture  is 
solid  and  substantial.  The  State  University  is  located  at  Columbia,  and  has  also 
been  characterized  by  a  remarkable  growth  since  the  war.  During  the  struggle 
its  buildings  were  occupied  by  United  States  troops,  and  its  sessions  were  entirely 
broken  up  ;  the  library  was  dispersed,  the  warrants  of  the  institution  were  afloat 
at  a  discount,  and  various  prejudices  had  nearly  ruined  it. 

At  last  Rev.  Dr.  Daniel  Read  took  the  presidency ;  and  the  reorganized 
University  comprises  a  normal  college,  an  agricultural  and  mechanical  college, 
opened  in  1870,  law  and  medical  schools,  and  a  department  of  chemistry,  and 
now  has  attached  to  it  a  "school  of  mines  and  metallurgy,"  established  at  Rolla, 
in  South-eastern  Missouri.  Into  this  mining  school  students  flock  from  all  direc- 
tions, turning  their  attention  toward  a  scientific  development  of  the  mineral 
resources  of  the  State.  Women  have  finally  been  admitted  to  the  University, 
and,  at  the  commencement  of  1872,  a  young  lady  was  advanced  to  the  baccalau- 
reate grade  in  science. 


XXIII. 


COMMERCE     OF     ST. 


LOUIS THE     NEW 

MISSISSIPPI. 


BRIDGE      OVER      THE 


THE  midsummer  heats,  during  which  I  visited  the  Exchange  of  St.  Louis, 
seem  to  make  but  little  difference  with  the  ardor  and  energy  of  its  mem- 
bers. The  typical  July  day  in  the  Missourian  capital  is  the  acme  of  oppressive 
heat ;  before  business  hours  have  begun,  the  sun  pours  down  bewildering  beams 
on  the  current  of  the  great  river,  on  the  toiling  masses  at  the  levee,  and  along 
the  airless  streets  rising  from  the  water-side. 

The  ladies  have  done  their  shopping  at  an  early  hour,  and  gone  their  ways ; 
paterfamilias  seeks  his  Avernus  of  an  office,  clad  only  in  thinnest  of  linen, 
and  with  a  palm-leaf  fan  in  his  hand ;  a  misty  aroma  of  the  ices  of  Hellery  or 
Gregory  floats  before  him  as  he  seats  himself  at  his  desk,  and  turns  over  the 
voluminous  correspondence  from  far  Texas,  from  the  vexed  Indian  Territory, 
from  the  great  North-west,  from  Arkansas,  or  from  the  hosts  of  river  towns  with 
which  the  metropolis  does  business. 

At  eleven  the  sun  has  become  withering  to  the  unaccustomed  Easterners,  but 
the  St.    Louis  paterfamilias  dons  his  broad  straw  hat,  and,  proceeding  to  the 

"  Merchants'  Exchange,"  a 
large  circular  room  into 
which  the  thirteen  hundred 
members  vainly  try  each 
day  to  cram  themselves,  he 
makes  his  way  to  the  corner 
allotted  to  his  branch  of 
trade,  and  patiently  swelters 
there  until  nearly  one  o'clock. 
In  this  single  room  every 
species  of  business  is  trans- 
acted ;  one  corner  is  devoted 
to  flour,  a  second  to  grain, 
a  third  to  provisions,  a 
fourth  to  cotton,  etc. 

A  whirlwind  of  fans  as- 

The  new  Post- Office  and  Custom-House  in  construction  at  St.  Louis.  tOnisheS  the   Stranger  Specta- 

tor ;  people  mop  their  foreheads  and  swing  their  palm-leaves  hysterically  as  they 
conclude  bargains  ;  and,  as  they  saunter  away  together  to  lunch,  still  vigor- 
ously fan  and  mop.      The  tumult  and  shouting  is  not  so  great  as  in  other  large 


COTTON   TRADE   OF   ST.   LOUIS A  RAILROAD  CENTRE.        2$l 

cities,  but  the  activity  is  the  same;  the  participants  from  time  to  time  refreshing 
themselves  at  great  cans  filled  with  sulphur  water.  But  in  a  few  years  the  mag- 
nificent new  Exchange  building,  which  will  be,  in  many  respects,  the  finest  on 
the  continent,  will  be  completed,  and  trade  will  not  only  be  classified,  but  will 
have  far  greater  facilities  for  public  transactions  than  at  present. 

St.  Louis  has  determined  to  become  a  leading  cotton  market,  and,  in  view  of 
the  new  railroad  development  ministering  directly  to  her,  it  seems  probable  that 
she  will  take  position  among  the  cotton  marts  of  the  world.  The  opening  of 
Northern  Texas,  and  of  the  whole  of  Arkansas,  to  immediate  connection  by  rail 
with  the  Missourian  capital,  and  the  probability — alas,  for  the  faithlessness  of 
nations  !  —  of  white  settlement  and  increase  of  cotton  culture  in  the  Indian  Ter- 
ritory, will  give  a  back-country  capable  of  producing  millions  of  bales  annually 
for  St.  Louis  to  draw  upon.  She  will  eventually  become  a  competitor  with 
Houston,  Galveston,  and  New  Orleans  for  the  distribution  of  the  crop  of  the 
South-west,  and  has  already,  as  she  believes,  received  sufficient  encouragement 
to  justify  the  building  of  large  storehouses  along  the  line  of  the  Iron  Mountain 
railroad. 

A  good  deal  of  the  cotton  once  handled  in  New  Orleans  has  lately  been 
going  to  New  York  by  rail,  and  the  St.  Louis  merchants  and  factors  are  now 
using  a  "  compress,"  by  means  of  which  23,000  pounds  of  cotton  can  be  placed 
in  a  single  freight  car.  The  city  is  receiving  only  40,000  to  60,000  bales 
annually,  but  confidently  counts  on  several  hundred  thousand  as  soon  as  it  has 
perfected  arrangements  for  transportation.  It  will,  without  doubt,  control  the 
cotton  in  certain  sections  of  Arkansas,  and  the  southern  portions  of  Missouri,  and 
can  make  very  seductive  bids  for  the  crops  of  many  sections  of  Texas. 

To  draw  the  attention  of  cotton- growers  toward  the  St.  Louis  market,  the 
Agricultural  Association  recently  offered  premiums  of  $10,000  for  the  best 
specimens  of  various  grades  of  cotton.  The  Atlantic  and  Pacific,  the  Missouri, 
Kansas  and  Texas,  the  St.  Louis  and  South-eastern,  the  Mobile  and  Ohio,  and 
the  Iron  Mountain  roads  will  probably  bring  large  quantities  of  cotton  to  St. 
Louis  in  the  future.  The  testimony  of  many  of  the  planters  of  Northern 
Texas  is  that  their  shipments  to  St.  Louis  have  been  far  more  satisfactory 
than   those    to    Galveston. 

St.  Louis  is  emphatically  the  railroad  centre  of  the  Mississippi  valley,  being 
the  actual  terminus  of  no  less  than  fourteen  important  railroads,  while  at  least 
thirty  are  pointed  toward  her.  By  all  the  railroads  and  by  river  routes  she 
received,  in  1872,  nearly  4,000,000  tons  of  freight,  being  a  vast  increase  over  her 
receipts  of  1871,  and  shipped  2,009,941  tons.  In  1872  the  railroads  alone 
brought  her  nearly  800,000  tons  of  coal.  In  1872  she  expended  $7,000,000  in 
new  buildings,  and  in  1873  about  $8,000,000. 

Through  her  vast  elevators,  four  of  which  are  located  along  the  banks  of  the 
Mississippi,  and  one  of  which  has  a  capacity  of  2,000,000  bushels,  passed  more 
than  28,000,000  bushels  of  grain  in  1872-;  and  in  1873  the  receipts  and  exports 
were  largely  increased  over  this  figure.  She  contributed  $2,500,000  in  duties 
from  her  custom-house  in  1872  ;  manufactured  in  1873,  1,384, 180  barrels  of  flour, 


232  PHASES     OF     THE     RIVER     TRADE. 

and  received  nearly  that  number  by  various  rail  and  river  routes;  received 
279,678  cattle,  and  shipped  188,306;  imported  and  exported  more  than  1,000,000 
swine ;  took  nearly  30,000  bales  of  hemp  into  market ;  handled  hundreds  of 
millions  of  feet  of  lumber,  shingles  and  laths  drifted  down  from  the  Upper 
Mississippi,  the  Black  and  the  Wisconsin  rivers ;  and  consummated  vast  bargains 
in  wool,  hides  and  tobacco. 

The  river  trade  has  many  peculiar  features,  and  is  subject  to  a  thousand 
fluctuations  and  adversities  which  make  it,  at  all  times,  hazardous.  For  many 
years  past  the  steamboat  men  have  had  unprofitable  seasons  to  bewail.  Their 
especial  enemies  have  been  low  water  and  railroad  competition.  The  railways 
may  in  future  gradually  absorb  the  carrying  trade  of  the  Mississippi  valley ;  but 
such  is  not  at  present  the  case.  The  rivers  have  thus  far  remained  the  principal 
arteries  of  commerce ;  and  the  moment  that  low  water  is  reached,  or  ice  closes 
navigation,  the  greatest  depression  is  visible  in  St.  Louis ;  trade  is  at  an  absolute 
stand- still. 

The  Mississippi  is  the  main  outlet  possessed  by  the  city  for  her  supplies  for 
southern  consumers.  In  view  of  this  fact,  it  is  of  the  greatest  importance  that 
the  river  should  receive  the  improvements  so  much  needed  between  the  mouths 
of  the  Missouri  and  the  Ohio.  A  formidable  system  of  dykes  and  dams,  it  is 
confidently  believed,  would  make  open  navigation  feasible  throughout  the  year. 

It  is  impossible  to  give  an  adequate  idea  of  the  picturesqueness  and  vivacity 
of  the  river  trade ;  it  must  be  seen.  One  appreciates  the  real  volume  of  the 
current  of  the  "  Father  of  Waters"  only  after  he  learns  something  of  the  multi- 
tude of  boats,  barges  and  rafts  on  its  ample  breast.  Every  conceivable  variety 
of  river-boat  grates  its  keel  against  the  St.  Louis  levee :  the  floating  palace,  the 
"Great  Republic;"  the  "Natchez,"  or  the  "Robert  E.  Lee;"  the  strong,  flat- 
bottomed  Red  river  packet ;  the  cruisers  of  the  Upper  Mississippi  and  of  the 
turbid  Missouri ;  the  barges,  in  long  procession,  laden  with  coal  and  iron  and 
lead  and  copper  ore ;  the  huge  arks  of  the  Transportation  Company,  each 
capable  of  receiving  100,000  bushels  of  grain  within  its  capacious  bosom ;  while 
rafts  of  every  size  and  shape  are  scattered  along  the  giant  stream  like  chips  and 
straws  on  a  mountain  brook. 

Nearly  3,000  steamboat  arrivals  are  annually  registered  at  the  port  of  St 
Louis.  Drifting  down  on  the  logs  come  a  rude  and  hardy  class  of  men,  who 
chafe  under  city  restraint,  requiring,  now  and  then,  stern  management.  Some- 
times one  of  these  figures,  suddenly  arriving  from  the  ancient  forests  on  the 
rivers  above,  creates  a  sensation  by  striding  through  a  fashionable  street,  his  long 
hair  falling  about  his  wrinkled  and  weather-beaten  face,  and  his  trusty  rifle  slung 
at  his  shoulder.  * 

The  steamboat  men  on  these  upper  waters  of  the  Mississippi  suffer  when  the 
"  ice  gorges"  come.  Faces  become  dark  with  anxiety  or  black  with  fear  at  the 
news  of  each  fresh  disaster.  Even  the  dreaded  "  low  water,"  with  all  the 
dangers  of  "  snags"  and  sunken  wrecks,  is  not  so  much  to  be  feared  as  one  of 
the  great  ice  sweeps  which,  with  its  glittering  teeth,  will  in  a  few  moments  grind 
to  atoms  hundreds  of  thousands  of  dollars'  worth  of  property. 


DISASTERS      ON      THE      MISSISSIPPI. 


233 


In  December  the  Mississippi,  at  St 
Louis,  is  sometimes  closed  by  ice,  and 
before  the  great  bridge  was  built, 
hundreds  of  teams  crossed  upon  the 
natural  bridge  to  and  from  the  Illinois 
shore.  The  breaking  up  is  sudden — 
dozens  of  boats  and  cargoes  being 
swept  away  and  annihilated.  Then 
come  the  stories  of  romantic  and  hair- 
breadth escapes  ;  the  population  along 
the  banks  becoming  wild  with  excite- 
ment over  the  pending  fate  of  some 
unfortunate  family  swept  out  into  the 
ice-filled  current.  Steamboat  owners 
even  hardly  dare  look  in  a  newspaper. 

In  1872  there  were  over  five  hund- 
red and  fifty  disasters  on  the  Missis- 
sippi river  and  her  tributaries — by 
few  of  which,  however,  was  there  any 
loss  of  life,  although  the  annual  des- 
truction of  property  is  enormous,  oc- 
curring in  almost  every  conceivable 
manner.  But  the  record  of  these 
disasters  is  not  without  its  grim  humor. 
One  can  hardly  repress  a  smile  at  the 
announcement,  in  the  terse,  expressive 
language  of  the  river,  that  "  Phil. 
Sheridan  broke  loose  at  St.  Louis,"  or 
that  "  Hyena  broke  her  engine,"  "  Lake 
Erie  ran  through  herself,"  "Mud  Hen 
blew  up  at  Bellevue,"  "  Enterprise 
broke  a  wrist  at  Cairo,"  "Andy  John- 
son blew  out  a  joint  near  Alton," 
"Wild  Cat  sunk  a  barge  at  Rising 
Sun,"  "  Humming  Bird  smashed  a 
shaft,"  "St.  Francis  broke  her  doctor," 
"  Daniel  Boone  was  crowded  on  shore 
by  ice,"  or  "John  Kilgour,  trying  to 
land  at  Evansville,  broke  nine  arms." 
The  river-men  have  not  been  sat- 
isfied to  confer  upon  their  beloved 
craft  the  names  of  heroes  and  saints. 
They  rake  up  all  fantastic  cognomens 
which  the  romance  of  the  centuries  or 
the  slang  of  the  period  can  afford,  be- 


234 


RIVER     BARGEMEN CAPTAIN      EADS, 


stowing  them  upon  clumsy  and  beautiful  crafts  alike,  while  they  pay  but  little 
regard  to  incongruities  of  gender  or  class:  the  "Naiad"  may  be  a  coal -barge, 
or  the  "Dry  Docks"  a  palace  steamer.  The  ice  makes  short  work  of  even  the 
largest  cargoes ;  the  river  will  swallow  up  several  hundred  thousand  bushels 
of  coal  or  grain  as  if  it  were  the  merest  bagatelle,  while  the  gorges  gape  for  more. 
Great  numbers  of  barges  ply  between  St.  Louis  and  Pittsburg,  via  the  Ohio, 
engaged  in  the  transportation  of  iron  ore.  It  is  a  long  and  wild  journey,  moving 
slowly  upon  the  treacherous  currents  of  the  two  great  streams,  the  men  on  the 
barges  sometimes  contenting  themselves  for  a  month  without  going  on  shore, 
living  on  rude  fare,  and  cuddling  with  their  families  in  little  cabins  in  the  boats' 

Wk~-  t  mm-  WJ&sm 

Bii 


View  of  the  Caisson  of  the  East  Abutment  of  the  St  Louis  Bridge,  as  it  appeared  during  construction. 

sides,  like  the  Belgian  canal-men.  Dozens  of  these  barges  are  always  moored  at 
Carondelet,  waiting  the  freights  which  pour  into  them  from  the  mines  in  the 
south-east  of  the  State.  When  navigation  throughout  the  Mississippi  valley 
shall  have  been  properly  improved,  the  river  trade  of  St.  Louis  will  be  quadrupled. 
The  triumph  in  engineering,  won  by  Captain  Eads  in  the  successful  comple- 
tion of  the  great  bridge,  is  a  magnificent  one.  This  was  not,  however,  the  first 
important  work  accomplished  by  him.  He  built  the  vessels  "  Benton,"  "Baron 
de  Kalb,"  "  Cincinnati,"  and  others,  used  with  such  effect  by  Admiral  Porter 
during  the  war.      He   afterward   constructed  fourteen  iron  clad s  for  the  United 


BRIDGING     THE      FATHER     OF     WATERS. 


235 


States,  and  he  invented  various  improvements  in  military  and  naval  defences. 
He  was  the  first  man  in  America  or  Europe  to  devise  successful  means  for 
operating  heavy  ordnance  by  steam.  He  knows  the  Mississippi  as  well  as  any 
one  can  know  that  most  capricious  and  uncertain  of  streams,  and  was,  of  all  men, 
best  qualified  for  the  work  of  bridging  the  current. 

It  was  evident  from  the  first  that  the  Father  of  Waters  would  not  consent  to 
be  bridged  without  a  struggle.  The  main  obstacles  to  the  construction  were,  of 
course,  the  width,  the  depth,  and  the  shifting  sands  of  the  river.  It  was  neces- 
sary to  take  into  account  the  certainty  of  an  enormous  increase  of  transportation, 
and  to  obstruct  navigation  as  little  as  possible.  The  foundations  must  be  planted 
on  the  rock-bed  below  the  fickle  and  dangerous  sands. 

Two  companies  for  building  the  bridge  were  at  first  organized,  one  chartered 
by  the  Missouri  Legislature,  the  other  by  that  of  Illinois.  The  company  char- 
tered in  Missouri  was  naturally  somewhat  jealous  of  the  other,  fearing  lest 
Chicago  might  play  some  game  against  the  interests  of  St.  Louis,  and  quite  a 
contest  ensued  until,  in  the  spring  of  1868,  a  consolidation  was  effected,  and  the 


The  building  of  the  East  Pier  of  the  St  Louis  Bridge. 

work  was  placed  under  the  direction  of  Captain  Eads  as  chief  engineer.  The 
new  corporation,  which  has  been  ably  officered,  assumed  the  title  of  the  Illinois 
and  St.  Louis  Bridge  Company.     The  original  estimate  of  the  cost  of  the  struc- 


236  THE     NEW     BRIDGE     AT     ST.     LOUIS. 

ture  was  $5,000,000;  but  the  whole  cost  will  probably  reach  $10,000,000,  two- 
thirds  of  which  sum  have  been  supplied  by  J.  T.  Morgan  &  Co.,  American 
bankers  in  London. 

The  greatest  difficulties  in  the  work  were  encountered  in  the  sinking  of  the 
piers.  Captain  Eads  decided  to  construct  them  of  solid  masonry,  and  to  sink 
them  by  means  of  pneumatic  caissons,  many  of  the  features  of  which  had  been 
designed  by  him  expressly  to  meet  the  exigencies  of  the  case.  The  caisson  for 
the  first  pier  was  made  of  heavy  wrought  iron,  weighed  500,000  pounds,  and  was 
82  feet  long,  60  feet  wide,  and  18  feet  high.  It  had  seven  air-chambers,  with 
thirteen  girders,  and  nearly  200  workmen  were  employed  on  it  for  four  months 
in  reaching  to  the  rock-bed  in  the  stream.  This  was  effected  at  a  depth  of  93 
feet  and  four  inches  below  the  surface  of  the  water,  in  March,  1870.  In  Novem- 
ber of  1870,  the  launch  of  the  caisson  to  be  used  in  laying  the  eastern  abutment 
pier  was  made  the  occasion  of  quite  a  public  celebration.  That  pier  now  rests  on 
the  rock  at  a  depth  of  130  feet  below  high  water  mark.  The  work  in  the  air- 
chambers  during  the  building  of  these  piers  was  difficult  and  dangerous,  and  from 
time  to  time  the  river,  as  if  angry  at  the  intrusion,  required  a  sacrifice  of  human  life. 
Sometimes  in  winter  the  work  was  interrupted  by  the  vast  masses  of  ice  hurled 
against  the  bridge-works ;  now  and  then  the  sand  outside  the  caissons  was  scoured 
away,  causing  the  sand  inside  (put  there  to  equalize  the  pressure)  to  burst  the 
walls ;  and  at  the  banks  great  trouble  was  experienced  in  setting  the  coffer  dams. 

But  all  obstacles  were  finally  overcome,  and  in  June  of  1874,  trains  began 
crossing  the  Mississippi  on  the  new  bridge.  It  now  stretches  from  the  foot  of 
Washington  avenue  in  St.  Louis  to  a  corresponding  point  on  the  Illinois  shore, 
at  an  elevation  of  fifty  feet  above  high  water. 

Its  extraordinary  breadth  of  span  and  depth  of  foundation  are  its  chief  merits. 
In  the  western  abutment  there  are  2,500  tons  of  stone,  and  in  the  eastern  abut- 
ment pier  45,000.  The  bridge  has  three  spans,  each  formed  with  four  ribbed 
arches  made  of  cast-steel.  The  centre  span  is  520  feet,  and  the  side  ones  are 
each  500  feet  in  the  clear.  The  four  arches  forming  each  of  these  spans  consist 
each  of  an  upper  and  lower  curved  rib,  extending  from  pier  to  pier,  and  between 
these  ribs  there  is  a  horizontal  system  of  bracing  for  the  purpose  of  securing  the 
arches  in  their  relative  distances  from-  each  other.  Two  centre  arches  of  each 
span  are  thirteen  feet  nine  and  a-half  inches  apart  from  centre  to  centre,  and  the 
upper  member  of  one  arch  is  secured  to  the  lower  one  of  the  other  by  a  system 
of  diagonal  bracing.  The  roadways  are  formed  by  transverse  iron  beams  twelve 
inches  in  depth,  suitably  separated. 

The  bridge  accommodates  two  double  steam  railway  tracks,  and  one  for 
street  railways,  besides  footwalks  and  a  carriage-way.  It  is  estimated  that  the 
annual  saving  to  St.  Louis  by  the  facilities  for  transportation  accorded  by  the 
bridge  will  amount  to  a  million  of  dollars. 

In  the  mere  item  of  coal,  which  is  carried  to  St.  Louis  from  the  Illinois  side, 
hundreds  of  thousands  of  dollars  will  be  saved  yearly.  A  fine  union  depot  will 
soon  be  erected  at  the  end  of  the  tunnel  through  which  trains  will  enter  and  leave 
St.  Louis  via  the  bridge. 


XXIV. 


THE      MINERAL      WEALTH      OF      MISSOURI. 


LET  us  peer  into  that  busy  suburban  ward  of  St.  Louis  which  still  clings  so 
fondly  to  its  old  French  name  of  "  Carondelet."  The  drive  thither  from 
the  city  carries  you  past  the  arsenal,  where  Government  now  and  then  has  a 
few  troops,  and  past  many  a  pretty  mansion,  into  the  dusty  street  of  a  prosaic 
manufacturing  town,  near  the  bank  of  the  Mississippi. 

Descending  toward  the  water- side  from  the  street  you  find  every  available 
space  crowded  with  mammoth  iron  and  zinc-furnaces,  in  whose  immense  struc- 
tures of  iron,  wood,  and  glass,  half-naked  men,  their  bodies  smeared  with 
perspiration  and  coal  dust,  are  wheeling  about  blazing  masses  of  metal,  or  guid- 


In  the  "Cut"  at  Iron  Mountain,  Missouri.     [Page  241.] 

ing  the  pliant  iron  bars  through  rollers  and  moulds,  or  cooling  their  heated  faces 
and  arms  in  buckets  of  water  brought  up  fresh  from  the  stream.  Here,  in  a  zinc- 
furnace,  half-a-dozen  Irishmen  wrestle  with  the  long  puddling  rods  which  they 


238 


THE      VULCAN      IRON      WORKS      AT      CARONDELET. 


thrust  into  the  seventy- times-seven  heated  furnaces;  the  green  and  yellowish 
flames  from  the  metal  are  reflected  on  their  pale  and  withered  features,  and  give 
them  an  almost  unearthly  expression. 

Farther  on,  the  masons  are  toiling  at  the  brick-work  of  a  new  blast-furnace, 
which  already  rears  its  tall  towers  a  hundred  feet  above  the  Mississippi  shore; 
not  far  thence  you  may  see  the  flaming  chimney  of  the  quaint  old  Carondelet 
furnace — the  first  built  in  all  that  section ;  or  may  linger  for  hours  in  such 
immense  establishments  as  the  South  St.  Louis  or  Vulcan  iron  works,  fancying 
them  the  growth  of  half  a  century  of  patient  upbuilding,  until  you  are  told  that 
nearly  every  establishment  has  been  created  since  the  war. 


At  the  Vulcan  Iron  Works  —  Carondelet 

The  Vulcan  Iron  Works,  which  now  employs  twelve  hundred  men  in  its  blast- 
furnaces and  rolling-mills,  overspreads  seventeen  acres,  boasts  $600,000  worth  of 
machinery,  and  has  two  furnaces  smelting  25,000  tons  of  ore  annually,  while  its 
rolling-mill  can  turn  out  45,000  tons  of  rail  in  a  year,  was  not  in  existence  in 
1870 ;  indeed,  there  was  not  a  brick  laid  on  the  premises.  There  is  nothing  else 
so  wonderful  as  this  in  the  South  or  South-west;  Kansas  City,  in  the  north- 
western part  of  the  State,  is  the  only  other  place  in  Missouri  which  can  show 
similar  material  progress. 

The  little  Riviere  des  Peres,  where  the  holy  Catholic  fathers  once  had  a  mis- 
sion among  the  Osage  Indians,  empties  into  the  Mississippi,  close  beside  the 
Vulcan  iron  works ;  its  banks  are  piled  high  with  coal  and  refuse.  The  fathers 
would  know  it  no  more.  They  would  stare  aghast  at  the  thousand  horse-power 
pump ;  at  the  myriads  of  fiery  snakes  crawling  about  on  the  floors  of  the  rolling- 
mill  ;  at  the  troops  of  Irish  laborers,  the  cautious  groups  about  the  doors  of 
the  sputtering  blast-furnace,  and  the  molten  streams  pouring  into  the  sand-beds 
to  form  into  "pigs"  of  iron;  and  could  hardly  credit  the  statement  that  Caron- 
delet furnaces  alone  can  manufacture  140,000  tons  of  iron  yearly. 


THE      ENGLAND     OF     TO-MORROW.  239 

This  sudden  and  marked  progress  at  Carondelet  is  significant.  Such  amazing 
growth  is  indicative  of  a  splendid  future.  The  elder  England  is  fading  out ;  her 
iron-fields  are  exhausted ;  and  her  producers  growl  because  American  iron- 
masters can  at  last  undersell  those  of  England.  The  heart  of  the  republic,  the 
great  commonwealth  of  Missouri,  is  to  be  the  England  of  to-morrow. 

Her  mineral  stores  are  inexhaustible.  There  are  a  thousand  railroads  locked 
up  in  the  great  coffers  of  the  Iron  Mountain.  A  thousand  iron  ships  lie  dormant 
in  the  ore-pockets  scattered  along  the  line  of  the  Atlantic  and  Pacific  railway, 
and  a  million  fortunes  await  the  men  who  shall  come  and  take  them.  Missouri 
is  one  of  the  future  great  foundries  of  the  world ;  the  coal-fields  of  Indiana  and 
Illinois  are  near  at  hand;  the  earth  is  stored  with  hematites;  the  hills  are  seamed 
with  speculars.     The  work  has  already  begun  in  earnest. 

Enough  good  iron  can  be  produced  from  Missouri  ores  and  Illinois  coal  to 
supply  the  wants  of  the  United  States  henceforth ;  and  at  the  rate  at  which 
furnaces  are  at  present  multiplying  throughout  the  State,  this  consummation  will 
be  reached.  All  the  conditions  for  a  favorable  competition  with  England  have 
at  last  been  arrived  at,  for  the  cost  of  labor  in  Missouri  furnaces  to-day  is  but  a 
trifle  more  than  it  is  in  the  cheapest  furnaces  in  Wales.  The  four  or  five  millions 
which  St.  Louis  now  has  invested  in  the  manufacture  of  pig-iron  will,  in  a  few 
years,  become  forty  or  fifty;  and  the  furnaces  in  South-eastern  Missouri,  aided  by 
those  in  Pennsylvania  supplied  with  ore  from  the  same  source,  will  girdle  the 
world  with  their  products.  The  aggregate  production  of  pig-iron  in  Missouri 
in  1870  was  54,000  tons;  in  1880  it  will  be  ten  times  that  amount,  for  the 
capacity  of  Carondelet  alone  in  1873  was  nearly  three  times  as  much  as  that  of 
the  whole  State  three  years  ago.*  If  St.  Louis,  unaided  by  any  special  interest, 
could  increase  the  value  of  her  manufactured  products  from  $27,000,000  in 
i860  to  more  than  $100,000,000  in  1870,  what  may  she  not  be  expected  to 
accomplish,  with  the  Iron  Mountain  at  her  back,  in  the  decade  at  whose  very 
beginning  she  has  demonstrated  such  wonderful  capacity  for  progress  ? 

How  long,  before,  with  proper  investment  of  capital,  St.  Louis  may  be  the 
centre  of  a  region  producing  as  many  millions  of  tons  of  pig-iron  annually  as 
are  now  produced  in  England  ?  Continuing  as  she  has  begun,  less  than  twenty 
years  will  place  her  at  that  pinnacle  of  commercial  glory. 

I  will  not  follow  the  ingenious  individuals  who  have  lightened  the  ennui  of 
their  leisure  by  computing,  upon  a  highly  speculative  basis,  the  exact  number  of 
tons  of  ore  contained  in  the  famous  Iron  Mountain.  But  there  is  no  doubt 
that  the  term  inexhaustible  can  with  justice  be  applied  to  its  stores. 

Certain  acute  English  witnesses  have  recently,  after  a  careful  survey,  declared 
that  the  coal  and  iron  deposits  of  Alabama  are  now  the  most  deeply  interesting 
material  facts  on  the  American  continent.  Whether  or  not  this  statement  is  at 
all  influenced  by  the  knowledge  that  numerous  investments  in  Alabama's  iron- 
fields  have   been   made  by   Englishmen,  or  by  ignorance  of  the  quantity  and 

*  The  coal  used  at  Carondelet  comes  from  the  Illinois  side  of  the  Mississippi,  and  a  new 
bridge  across  the  stream  at  that  point  is  contemplated,  that  the  high  prices  charged  during  the 
icy  season  may  be  avoided. 

16 


24O  THE     IRON     REGION     OF     MISSOURI. 

quality  of  the  ore  in  Missouri,  I  do  not  know;  but  the  latter  State  may  cer- 
tainly claim  an  equal  share  in  the  interest  which  her  sister  of  the  South  has 
awakened,  so  far  as  the  value  of  her  deposits  is  concerned.  If  it  can  be  said  that 
the  hematites  of  Alabama,  which  yield  fifty-six  per  cent,  of  pure  iron,  will 
compare  favorably  with  the  best  ores  of  Cumberland  and  the  North  of  Spain, 
what  shall  we  say  of  the  ores  of  Missouri,  which  in  many  cases  boast  a  proven 
yield  of  sixty-six  per  cent.  ? 

The  main  iron  region  of  Missouri  is  situated  in  the  south-east  and  southern 
portions  of  the  State,  and  the  greater  portion  of  it  is  adjacent  and  directly  tribu- 
tary to  St.  Louis.  The  hundreds  of  thousands  of  tons  of  ore  annually  sent  out  of 
the  State  to  be  smelted  all  pass  through  or  near  the  great  city. 

My  visit  to  the  Iron  Mountain  had  been  resolved  upon  before  I  entered  Mis- 
souri ;  but  my  wildest  ideas  of  its  importance  were  none  too  exaggerated  for  the 
reality.  The  "mountain"  is  situated  eighty- one  miles  south-west  of  St.  Louis, 
on  the  Arkansas  branch  of  the  Iron  Mountain  railroad.  The  route  thither  in 
summer-time  is  charming.  The  railroad  runs  so  near  to  the  banks  of  the  Missis- 
sippi (there  high  and  rugged),  that  nervous  people,  not  fascinated  by  the  grand 
outlook  over  the  current,  may  confess  to  a  tremor  now  and  then. 

But  the  exquisite  shapes  of  the  foliage  on  the  one  bank,  and  the  great 
expanse  of  the  "bottoms"  on  the  other,  made  a  pleasing  picture,  to  which  the 
dazzling  sheen  of  the  broad  sheet  of  smoothly-flowing  water,  bearing  lightly 
forward  the  white  steamers  and  the  dark,  flat  barges,  lent  a  strange  charm. 
From  Bismarck,  a  pretty  little  station  among  pleasant  fields,  it  was  but  a  brief 
ride  to  Iron  Mountain  station,  the  town  which  has  grown  up  out  of  the  mining 
interests  managed  and  owned  in  these  latter  years  by  Chouteau,  Harrison,  and 
Valle.  Three  of  the  wealthiest  families  in  Missouri,  are  represented  in  the  owner- 
ship of  this  and  the  adjacent  region,  and  each  has  been  much  interested  in  the 
material  development  of  the  State. 

The  "  mountain,"  which  rises  rather  abruptly  from  a  beautiful  valley,  land- 
locked and  filled  with  delicious  fields,  was  originally  rather  more  than  200  feet 
high,  and  its  base  covers  an  area  of  500  acres.  All  the  country  round  about  is 
still  crowded  with  reminiscences  of  Spanish  domination.  The  names  of  some  of 
the  counties  and  towns  are  French  and  Spanish  souvenirs ;  and  the  "  King's 
Highway,"  running  through  St.  Francois  county,  is  still  often  called  by  its 
original  name. 

The  people  in  the  vicinity  are  quiet  and  usually  well-to-do  farmer  folk,  and 
look  upon  the  mountain  as  the  most  wonderful  of  natural  phenomena.  The 
French  and  Spaniards  seem  never  to  have  suspected  the  rich  nature  of  the 
queerly-shaped  elevation  and  its  surroundings ;  for  the  original  possessor,  Joseph 
Pratte,  who  obtained  it  by  a  grant  from  Zenon  Trudeau,  the  Spanish  governor, 
in  September  of  1797,  mentions  in  his  petition  for  a  grant  that  the  land  is  sterile, 
and  only  fit  for  grazing. 

Pratte's  grant  composed  some  20,000  arpents,  or  17,000  English  acres,  and 
from  his  hands  it  became  the  property  of  Van  Doren,  Pease  &  Co.,  who,  in  1837, 
were  recognized  as  the  Iron  Mountain  Company.     Congress  had  meantime  con- 


IRON      MOUNTAIN MISSOURI. 


241 


firmed  the  Spanish  grants.  In  1843  the  American  Iron  Mountain  Company 
took  the  place  of  the  above-mentioned  firm.  August  Belmont,  of  New  York, 
was  among  the  subscribers  to  the  capital  stock,  which  was  $273,000;  and  James 
Harrison,  of  St.  Louis,  one  of  the  most  energetic  iron  workers  of  the  West,  was 
its  first  president. 

For  many  years  the  investments  of  the  original  companies  did  not  pay,  and 
the  investors  were  sneered  at  as  guilty  of  an  act  of  folly. 

In  those  days  the  Iron  Mountain  railroad  was  not,  and  all  the  ore  dug  out 
was  hauled  painfully  forty-five  miles  in  carts  to  the  ancient  town  of  St.  Gene- 
vieve. But  when  pig-iron  became  worth  $85  per  ton,  there  was  no  lack  of 
energy  in  examining  the  real  resources  of  the  mountain,  and  since  1862  the 
company  has  taken  millions  of  tons  of  ore  from  the  surface  and  from  the  deep 
incisions  made  in  the  hill- sides. 

The  ores  there,  as  throughout  the  section,  are  mainly  rich  specular  oxides, 
and  were  originally  pronounced  too  rich  to  work.  Even  to  this  day  the  surface 
specimens  are  plenteous,  and  one  could  readily  pick  up  a  cart-load  of  lumps  all 
ready  for  the  furnace.  In  the  deep  cuts  and  along  the  mountain  sides  more  than 
1 ,000  men  were  at  work  at  the  time  of  my  visit,  Irishmen,  Swedes  and  Germans 
predominating. 


The  Furnace  —  Iron  Mountain,  Missouri.     [Page  242.] 


The  mountain  is  composed  almost  exclusively  of  iron  in  its  purest  form,  and 
the  regiment  of  laborers  mine  ore  enough  to  load  125  cars,  carrying  10  tons  each, 
daily,  besides  supplying  two  furnaces  of  large  capacity,  established  at  the  base  of 
the  mountain.  A  century  of  hammering  at  the  hill's  sides  will  not  bring  it  level 
with  the  valley.     The  surface  ore  is  so  intermingled  even  with  the  earth,  that  I 


242  MR.     EDWIN     HARRISON  —  PILOT     KNOB IRON      COUNTY. 

found  a  number  of  stout  Swedes  washing  it  very  much  as  gold  is  washed  for,  and 
extracting  tons  which,  in  more  careless  days,  had  been  thrown  away. 

Iron  Mountain  is  a  typical  Missouri  mining  town.  It  was  mainly  built  up  by 
Hon.  John  G.  Scott,  of  St.  Louis,  an  ex- Congressman,  and  largely  identified 
with  all  the  iron  interests  of  that  section.  Mr.  Edwin  Harrison,  the  present 
president,  and  one  of  the  principal  owners,  is  an  accomplished  metallurgist,  one 
of  the  most  active  business  men  in  the  South-west,  and  interested  in  a  dozen 
large  and  successful  enterprises  connected  with  the  development  of  metal.  Both 
at  Iron  Mountain  and  at  Irondale,  as  well  as  at  other  mining  towns  which  I 
visited,  the  workmen  have  built  handsome  cottages,  and  liquor  and  the  other 
debasing  influences  sometimes  found  at  mines  are  beyond  their  reach. 

There  was  a  subtle  charm  about  the  roar  and  ominous  hum  of  the  great  fur- 
naces after  dark,  when  the  clink  of  the  hammers  and  the  noise  of  the  blasting 
on  the  mountain  had  ceased,  and  darkness  had  shrouded  the  little  valley.  The 
chimneys  of  the  "  blasts"  glowed  like  dragons'  eyes ;  the  semi-nude  figures  flitting 
in  the  huge  open  sheds,  before  the  doors  of  the  furnaces,  looked  like  demons. 

When  the  masses  of  broken  and  carefully-selected  ore,  together  with  the 
requisite  charcoal  and  limestone,  had  been  transfused  in  the  fearful  heat,  and  the 
blast  was  ready  to  be  drawn  off,  the  workmen  gathered  half  timorously  about 
the  aperture  whence  the  molten  iron  was  to  flow,  and  gave  it  vent.  Then  first 
sprang  out  a  white  current — the  slag — looking  like  gypsum,  and  hardening  as  it 
touched  the  sand.  Finally  came  the  deep  fiery  glow  of  the  iron  itself,  as  it 
flowed  resistlessly  down  the  channels  cut  in  the  sand  to  receive  it,  hissing  fiercely 
from  time  to  time,  and  lighting  up  the  great  stone  vault  of  the  furnace  with  an 
unearthly  glare,  then  "  dying  into  sullen  darkness,"  and  forming  the  cold,  hard, 
homely  bars  which  are  one  day  rolled  into  the  rails  by  means  of  which  we  anni- 
hilate distance,  and  build  cities  like  St.  Louis. 

The  whole  region  round  about  is  rich  in  mines  and  minerals.  A  few  miles 
below  Iron  Mountain  rises  Pilot  Knob,  a  stately  peak  towering  far  above  the 
lovely  Ozark  range  which  surrounds  it  in  every  direction ;  and  from  the  por- 
phyry there  and  on  Shepherd  Mountain  great  quantities  of  ore  are  extracted. 
It  is  the  boast  of  the  people  of  the  section  that  Iron  county,  in  which  lie  Shep- 
herd, Arcadia  and  Bogy  mountains  and  the  Knob,  contains  more  iron  than  any 
other  equal  area  known  on  the  globe. 

From  this  valley  more  than  100,000  tons  of  iron  have  been  shipped  since  the 
formation  of  the  Pilot  Knob  Iron  Company.  The  works  there  and  elsewhere 
in  this  section  were  much  injured,  and  some  of  them  were  burned,  during  the 
war,  by  Price's  raiders.  -  The  silicious  and  magnetic  and  specular  oxides  found  in 
the  Pilot  Knob  and  Shepherd  Mountain  region  are  abundant  and  pure.  The 
specular  oxides  abound  in  Dent,  Crawford,  Phillips  and  Pulaski  counties.  The 
beds  of  bog  ore  extend  for  miles  among  the  swamps  and  cypresses  in  South- 
eastern Missouri ;  and  hematite  ores  are  found  in  almost  every  county  in  the 
south  of  the  State.  Throughout  the  coal-measures  of  the  commonwealth  there 
are  vast  beds  of  spathic  ore,  which  will  serve  when  the  more  available  deposits 
have  been  exhausted. 


THE     MISSOURI      COAL      FIELD  —  LEAD     MINES. 


243 


The  Summit  of  Pilot  Knob — Iron  County,  Missouri.     [Page  242.] 


And  this  is  not  all.  For  miles  and  miles  along  the  Missouri  river,  iron  crops 
out  from  the  bold  and  picturesque  bluffs,  and  it  is  estimated  that  it  can  be  easily 
mined  and  placed  in  barges  for  less  than  a  dollar  per  ton.  On  the  line  of  the 
Atlantic  and  Pacific  railroad  also,  vast  deposits  of  the  blue  specular  variety  are 
gradually  being  un- 
earthed. At  Scotia,  at 
Sullivan,  at  Jamestown, 
at  Salem,  the  treasures 
of   iron    arc    astonishing. 

Missouri  should  take 
care  to  keep  the  furnaces 
for  smelting  these  ores 
withis^  her  borders,  for 
pig-iron  and  Bessemer 
steel  can  to-day  be  made 
cheaper  there,  at  the 
present  prices  of  labor 
and  coal,  than  in  Penn- 
sylvania. If  America 
desires  or  intends  one  day 
to  supply  Europe  with 
the  ore  which  she  is  beginning  to  clamor  for,  the  policy  of  transporting  the 
ores  from  these  fresh  fields  to  the  furnaces  in  the  Quaker  State  seems  neither 
wise  nor  economical.  The  stores  of  coal  match  those  of  iron ;  it  was  long  ago 
estimated  that  Missouri  had  an  area  of  26,000  square  miles  of  coal-beds  between 
the  mouth  of  the  Des  Moines  river  and  the  Indian  Territory ;  and  along  all  the 
railroads  in  Northern  Missouri,  and  beside  the  Missouri  Pacific,  coal-veins  have 
proved  very  extensive. 

The  development  of  the  lead  mines  of  Missouri  is  full  of  romance.  De  Soto, 
disdaining  any  thing  save  gold,  carelessly  passed  them  by.  One  hundred  and 
fifty  years  ago  Renault  and  La  Motte  hunted  in  the  Ozark  hills  for  the  precious 
metal,  but  only  found  lead,  and  to-day  La  Motte's  mine  is  still  called  by  his 
name.  As  early  as  18 19  the  annual  yield  of  the  lead  mines  in  the  State  was 
3,000,000  of  pounds;  in  1870  the  annual  production  amounted  to  nearly 
14,000,000;  and  in  1872  it  had  risen  to  over  20,000,000. 

The  revival  of  the  lead  mining  interest,  in  1872,  created  almost  as  much 
excitement  in  certain  sections  as  if  gold  had  been  in  question.  The  largest 
investments  were  made  in  South-western  and  Central  Missouri ;  old  mines  were 
reopened,  new  machinery  was  hurried  in,  and  in  Jasper  county,  a  wild  section 
on  the  borders  of  Kansas  and  the  Indian  Territory,  a  new  town  sprang  up  as  by 
magic  in  the  midst  of  a  section  where  lead  lay  near  the  surface.  There  was 
genuine  California  enthusiasm ;  furnaces,  stores,  shops,  hotels  and  churches 
arose  on  Joplin  creek,  and  the  town  of  "Joplin"  was  born.  An  impulse  was 
given  to  the  lead  production  of  Missouri,  which  will  not  decline  until  the  imports 
of  lead  from  Europe  to  this  country  have  been  vastly  reduced. 


244 


MINERAL     INTERESTS     TRIBUTARY     TO      ST.      LOUIS. 


The  area  of  the  lead  region  comprises  nearly  7,000  square  miles.  In  the 
neighborhood  of  Jasper  and  Newton  counties  are  large* stores  of  zinc  ores,  sup- 
posed to  extend  into  the  Indian  Territory.  In  the  counties  of  St.  Francois  and 
Madison  there  is  a  fine  vein  of  lead,  of  great  length,  "  running  at  large"  through 
limestone  strata.  Upon  this  vein  are  the  splendid  properties  of  the  Mine  La 
Motte  Company.  Most  of  the  lead  in  that  vicinity,  and  in  Franklin,  Wash- 
ington, Jefferson,  Crawford,  Phelps,  Dent,  and  other  counties,  carries  cobalt  and 
nickel  in  abundance,  and  not  far  away,  brown  hematite  iron  ores  are  found  in 
profusion.  The  extension  of  the  Iron  Mountain  and  the  Atlantic  and  Pacific 
railroads  through  the  mineral  regions  has  done  more  for  the  future  development 
of  the  State  than  all  other  efforts  put  together. 

In  a  few  years  both  roads  will  be  lined  with  furnaces  and  mines  of  all  descrip- 
tions, and  will  extend  branches  in  every  direction.  Several  varieties  of  copper 
are  found  in  the  State,  and  the  mines  in  Shannon,  Madison,  and  Franklin  coun- 
ties have  been  worked  successfully.  New  discoveries  of  zinc  ore  are  daily  made 
in  all  sections ;  cobalt,  nickel,  manganese,  tin,  and  marble  are  also  found.  The 
Ozark  marbles  of  Missouri  are  already  famous ;  they  aid  in  the  adornment  of  the 
national  capital.  Excellent  building  limestones,  coarse,  reddish  granite  and 
various  shades  of  sandstones,  are  to  be  found  in  all  quarters. 

But  the  iron  and  coal  interests  tributary  to  St.  Louis  dominate  all  others,  and 
give  the  finest  promise.  It  is  evident  that  Missouri  is  about  to  enter  as  a  for- 
midable competitor  upon  one  of  the  greatest  industrial  fields  in  the  world.  She 
has  cheap  food  in  a  strong  new  country,  rapidly  receiving  immigration.  She  has 
ores  of  surpassing  richness  lying  close  to  the  surface.  She  has  coal  in  vast  areas, 
easily  mined — coal,  too,  which  does  not  require  coking  before  it  aids  in  the 
smelting  of  iron  ore.  She  has  an  economical  system  of  inter-communication  by 
river  and  rail,  backed,  we  may  hope  and  predict,  by  plenty  of  money  in  the 
strong  boxes  of  the  fathers  of  St.  Louis.      The  time  is  coming  when  that  capital, 

which  has  so  long  lain  dormant,  will 
be  awakened,  and  turned  into  the  ser- 
vice of  the  industry  that  in  less  than 
a  generation  is  to  make  St.  Louis  a 
city  with  a  million  inhabitants. 

Here  we  are  again  at  Carondelet 
— passing  the  long  ore-trains  hourly 
arriving  from  the  Iron  Mountain. 
What  crowding,  what  noise  and  clang 
of  machinery,  what  smoke  and  stench 
of  coal !  The  workmen,  with  thick 
leather  aprons  about  their  waists,  and 
gloves  on  their  hands,  are  bringing 
the  bars  of  pig-iron  from  the  blast- 
furnaces, and  cording  them  up  by 
hundreds.  Here  is  a  crowd  of  per- 
piiot  Knob,  Missouri.   iPage  242.]  turbed    Irish    laborers,    shrieking  and 


AN      UNFORTUNATE     WORKMAN. 


245 


dancing  around  a  prostrate  man,  whose  limbs  have  been  scarred  and  seared 
by  a  sudden  spurt  of  hot  iron  from  the  furnace.  His  comrades  are  bending 
over  him,  eagerly  cutting  away  his  garments  with  their  knives,  while  the  iron 
burns  its  way  into  his  flesh. 


MAP    OF    MISSOURI. 


XXV. 


TRADE     IN     ST.     LOUIS — THE     PRESS — KANSAS     CITY- 
THE     MISSISSIPPI--— THE     CAPITAL. 


•ALONG 


FROM  Carondelet  we  may  return  cityward  by  another  route,  climbing  the  hill 
which  leads  to  Grand  avenue,  and  wandering  up  a  country  road  to  a  vine- 
yard, and  a  "garden- close"  among  beautiful  shrubbery.  The  hills  around  are 
covered  with  vineyards,  or  rich  fields  of  corn  and  other  cereals.  Returning  to 
Grand  avenue,  you  may  drive  through  the  new  "Tower  Grove  "  park,  with  its 


View  in  Shaw's  Garden  —  St  Louis. 

pretty  arbors,  rustic  houses,  and  clumps  of '  trees  ;  past  Lafayette  park,  much  like 
one  of  the  great  squares  in  the  West  End  of  London,  and,  rattling  through  street 
after  street,  lined  with  elegant  houses,  descend  at  last  toward  the  banks  of  the 
river  and  the  business  section  of  the  town. 

Although  the  suburbs  of  St.  Louis  are  not  remarkable,  there  are  many 
attractive  parks  and  parklets  near  at  hand.  The  superb  botanical  garden  known 
as  "Shaw's,"  adjoining  the  "Tower  Grove"  park,  is  the  especial  pride  of  Mis- 
souri. The  Forest  park,  containing  fourteen  hundred  acres,  clothed  in  delicious 
foliage,  dotted  with  elms,  oak,  ash  and  sycamores,  festooned  with   grape-vines, 


THE      FAIR-GROUND PROMENADES     IN     AND      AROUND      ST.      LOUIS.      247 


and  watered  by  the  capricious  little  Riviere  des  Peres,  is  not  as  yet  improved,  but 
will  doubtless  be  the  principal  recreation  ground  of  the  city  in  time.  Lindell, 
Belmont,  and  the  Park  of  Fruits,  are  all  beautiful ;  and  the  park  upon  which  the 
famous  St.  Louis  fair  is  annually  held  has  many  lovely  winding  walks,  garden- 
spots,  and  knots  of  shrubbery. 

To  this  fair-ground  every  October  many  thousands  of  visitors  flock  from 
the  whole  Mississippi  valley ;  and  the  vast  amphitheatre,  which  will  seat 
twenty -five  thousand  people,  is  daily  crowded  by  a  constantly  changing 
audience.  St.  Louis  worships  annually  one  day  at  the  shrine  of  this  fair, 
which  is  mechanical  as  well  as  agricultural  in  its  scope.  All  business  is 
suspended ;  schools  are  closed,  and  a  species  of  high  carnival  is  inaugurated. 
Inside  the  amphitheatre  there  is  a  huge  procession  of  horses,  cattle,  sheep, 
and  swine,  at  which  the  good  burghers  look  on  something  after  the  fashion 
of  ancient  Romans  at  the  Coliseum. 

The  stranger  will  do  well  to  wander  the  whole  city  over — dine  at  Porcher's, 
and  loiter  in  the  pleasant  parlors  of  the  "University  Club;"  to  attend  the 
concerts  at  Uhrig's,  and  the  mass  in  the  old  cathedral ;  inspect  the  plafonds  and 
other  gorgeous  splendors  of  the  palace  in  which  the  St.  Louis '  Life  Insurance 
Company  transacts  its  business ;  see 
Benton  on  his  pedestal  in  Lafayette 
park  ;  and  visit  the  burial  grounds  of 
beautiful  Bellefontaine.  He  may  dive 
into  the  great  vaults  of  the  Imperial 
Wine  Company,  where  a  million  bottles 
of  native  champagne  lie  always  cooling; 
or  do  reverence  to  the  Water  Works, 
where  two  powerful  engines  each  force 
the  Mississippi  river  to  contribute 
seventeen  million  gallons  daily  to  supply 
the  wants  of  the  city;  or  have  a  peep 
at  the  prisons  of  the  "  Four  Courts," 
and  even  be  a  looker-on  at  the  matinee, 
locally  known  as  "The  Terrible  Court," 
where  a  police  judge  dispenses  justice, 
sends  vagrants  to  the  workhouse  for  a 
thousand  days,  and  suspicious  charac- 
ters across  the  river  in  twenty  minutes. 
Or  he  may  explore  the  score  of  mam- 
moth foundries,  where  iron  is  manu- 
factured in  every  form,  from  gas-piping 

to     architectural     WOrk    for     houses  *     Or  Statue  to  Thomas  H.  Benton,  in  Lafayette  Park. 

gaze  at  the  dome  of  the  imposing  Court -House, — a  kind  of  miniature  "St. 
Paul's," — or  climb  the  hill  at  the  city's  back,  on  which  the  ungainly  Lunatic 
Asylum  stands.  Or  he  may  visit  the  First  Presbyterian  and  Christ  churches; 
or    inspect    the    Gratiot    street    prison,    where    many    sympathizers    with    the 


248 


THE     PRESS     OF     ST.      LOUIS. 


IllllHp 


fi 


cause  of  the  South  were  confined  during  the  late  war.  But  after  all  this,  he 
may  look  about  and  be  surprised  to  find  that  a  city  of  four  hundred  and  fifty 
thousand  inhabitants   cannot    boast  a  first-class    theatre,*  and    is   compelled  to 

have  its  opera  season  in 
a  second-rate  variety  hall. 
If  one  insists  on  being 
amused,  however,  he  can 
read  the  editorial  columns 
of  the  leading  newspapers, 
and  note  the  playful  ani- 
mosity which  evidently 
guides  the  editorial  pens, 
getting  a  lesson  or  two, 
meanwhile,  in  journalism ; 
for  St.  Louis  is  as  rich  in 
journals  as  it  is  poor  in 
theatres,  —  The  Democrat, 
The  Republican,  The   Globe, 

The  "Four  Courts"  Building— St  Louis.     \  Page  247. 1  J      t-7       t-  hi 

47  J  and    Ihe  Times  all  showing 

admirably  equipped  establishments.  The  Republican  building  is  one  of  the 
most  elegant  and  complete  newspaper  offices  in  the  world;  there  is  but 
one  in  the  country  which  equals  it,  and  that  is  in  New  York.  The  Democrat 
is  a  Republican  journal,  and  The  Re- 
publican is    Democratic. 

The  first  number  of  The  Republican 
was  issued  in  1808,  as  The  Gazette, 
printed  on  a  rude  press  of  Western  man- 
ufacture.   It  has  twice  arisen,  an  untiring- 

phoenix,   from  the  ruins  of  great  fires. 
Mr.  Knapp,  its  editor,  was  always   an 

opponent  of  secession,  although  strictly 

his  paper  might  now  be  classed  as  an 

opposition  sheet.      The  Democrat  was  an 

early   advocate  of  free   soil  principles, 

and  a  stout  defender  of  the  new  Repub- 
lican  party   in    the    troublesome  times 

following  the  election  of  Buchanan.      It 

is  now  ably  managed   by   George   W. 

Fishback,  one  of  the  leading  journalists 

of  the  West.      The   Globe  grew  out  of 

a  division  of  interests  in  The  Democrat ;  Thc  Gratiot  street  Prison— St.  Louis.    (Page  247.] 

both  it  and    The   Times  have  grown  up  handsomely.       The  Dispatch  and    The 

Journal  are   evening   papers,   respectively  Democratic    and    Republican.      The 


*  There  are  several  theatrical  buildings,  but  there  is  no  regularly  organized  theatre. 


THE   INCREASE  OF   TRADE. 


249 


religious  and  literary  press  of  the  city  numbers  several  able  periodicals,  among 
which  is    The  Southern  Review,  a  quarterly  of  national  reputation. 

The  higher  intellectual  life  in  St.  Louis  is  not  apparently  so  vigorous  as  that 
of  many  of  the  Eastern  cities.  The  nature  of  its  population  prevents  a  large  and 
symmetrical  growth  at  present  in  that  direction.  A  great  portion  of  that  popula- 
tion is  either  foreign  born,  or  in  the  transition  from  the  old  to  the  new  nationality; 
and  the  material  growth  of  the  city  and  the  neighboring  country  is  so  "  fierce 
and  vast "  *  that  people  have  little  time  for  abstractions,  or  for  the  graces  and 
culture  which  come  with  literature  and  art.  There  are  one  or  two  promising 
artists,  and  Mr.  Diehl  and  Mr.  Pattison  have  done  some  good  work. 

It  has  been  said  that  no  course  of  lectures  has  ever  paid  in  St.  Louis ;  this 
seems  astonishing,  if,  indeed,  it  be  the  fact-    The  libraries  are  numerous  and 
good.      The  Mercantile  is  the  largest,  and  its  spacious  rooms  are  adorned  with 
statues   by  Miss    Hosmer,   and   other 
sculptors    of  note. 

Of  course  the  city  boasts  many 
splendid  interiors  and  almost  princely 
establishments.  It  could  hardly  fail 
to  produce  them,  with  a  dry-goods 
trade  which,  in  1872,  aggregated 
fifty  millions  of  dollars,  and  is  steadily 
increasing  at  the  rate  of  thirty  per 
cent,  yearly.  Before  the  war  the  dry- 
goods  business  engaged  but  from  ten 
to  twelve  millions.  The  retail  trade 
of  one  dry-goods  establishment  in 
St.  Louis  now  amounts  to  more 
than  six  million  dollars  annually,  and 
there  are  two  which  boast  a  million, 
and  four  half- a -million  each.  The 
trade  in  groceries  spreads  over  an 
immense  section,  there  being  in  this  business  three  firms  whose  transactions 
amount  to  two  millions  each  annually,  and  no  less  than  seven  which  claim 
a  million  each. 

The  sales  of  sugar  by  one  of  the  principal  sugar  refinery  companies  amounted 
to  32,000,000  pounds  in  1872,  and  yielded  the  Government  nearly  $1,000,000  of 
revenue.  The  wholesale  trade  in  hardware  counts  up  several  millions,  and  in  1871 
seven  wholesale  firms  reported  sales  varying  from  $600,000  to  $150,000.  More 
than  one  hundred  million  feet  of  lumber  are  usually  on  hand  in  the  St.  Louis 
markets.  From  five  to  seven  million  dollars  are  invested  in  leather  manufac- 
tures, and  the  annual  sales  exceed  fifteen  millions.  Three  -  fourths  of  all  the 
sheetings  sold  in  St.  Louis  are  now  manufactured  in  cotton  mills  in  the  Missis- 
sippi valley,  and  St.  Louis  herself  has  considerable  capital  invested  in  the  manu- 
facture of  textile  fabrics  for  her  own  market. 


First  Presbyterian  Church — St.  Louis.     [Page  247.] 


See  General  Walker's  preface  to  last  Census  Report. 


250 


GAIN      SINCE      THE      WAR SOCIAL      LEGISLATION. 


Christ  Church — St.  Louis.     [Page  247.] 


The  gain  which  the  city  has  made  since  the  war  is  shown  by  the  statement  that 
in  i860  the  capital  invested  in  manufactures  there  was  about  $13,000,000,  while 
it  is  now  more  than  $60,000,000.      Fine  churches,   hospitals,  and   many  worthy 
charities  show  that  much  of  the  profit  from  these  immense  businesses  is  properly 
.-■jg^  _        __  __  employed.*      In  the  local  and  muni- 

a    ,  cipal  politics  there  are  but  few  excite - 

#  ^?  ments.      The    Germans    are    not   so 

readily  welcomed  in  official  positions 
as  they  once  were,  because  a  pretty 
liberal  exercise  of  power  had  revived 
their  feeling  of  nationality  rather  too 
strongly,  and  they  were  making 
German  blood  an  overweening  quali- 
fication   for    office. 

The  true  valuation  of  the  property 
within  the  limits  of  St.  Louis  city  is 
$475,000,000.  The  bonded  debt  of 
the  metropolis  is  a  little  over 
$14,000,000;  the  floating  debt  is 
$543,669 ;  the  amount  of  cash  and 
assets  now  in  the  sinking  fund, 
$805,744.  It  is  impossible  in  the  limits  of  a  work  of  this  description  to 
give  an  exact  statement  of  the  amount  of  trade,  and  increase  in  wealth  and 
manufactures.  I  have  endeavored  merely  to  show  how  vigorous  and  substantial 
that  increase  has  been.  New  industries  are  constantly  locating  at  St.  Louis,  or  in 
its  immediate  vicinity ;  and  a  persistence  is  shown  in  their  establishment  which 
augurs  grand  results.  The  history  of  glass  manufacture  there  has  been  one  of 
disaster  for  many  years  ;  it  is  said  that  a  million  dollars  has  been  sunk  in  unsuc- 
cessful efforts  to  establish  it,  but  at  last  St.  Louis  has  the  credit  of  an  establish- 
ment which  can  produce  plate- glass,  said  to  be  equal  to  the  best  of  European 
manufacture. 

St.  Louis  is,  I  believe,  the  only  city  in  the  United  States  which  ever  adopted  the 
Continental  method  of  licensing  the  social  evil,  and  there  has  been  a  great  battle 
recently  fought  over  it,  in  which  church,  society,  and  the  Legislature  took  active 
part.  Mayor  Brown,  progressive  and  liberal  in  municipal  matters,  sided  with  the 
license  system,  maintaining  that  it  was  the  only  means  to  the  much  desired 
end — reform  and  control  of  the  fallen.  The  money  received  from  license  fees 
was  devoted  purely  to  the  furthering  of  reformatory  measures.  The  Legislature 
was  induced  to  consider  the  matter  seriously,  and  St.  Louis  was  finally  compelled 
to  relinquish  a  system  which  has  been  so  much  debated.  Missouri  maintains  a 
State  lottery,  and  that  too  has  been  somewhat  discussed.  It  is  honestly  admin- 
istered, but  seems  poor  business  for  a  State  to  lend  its  sanction  to. 

*  These  figures  only  serve  to  show  the  condition  of  trade  in  St.  Louis  in  1873-74;  the  growth 
and  increase  is  so  rapid  that  it  is  almost  impossible  to  collect  statistics  one  month  which  will  be 
correct  the  next. 


KANSAS     CITY,     MISSOURI.  25I 

The  Missouri  river,  flowing  from  west  to  east  through  the  commonwealth, 
divides  the  State  into  northern  and  southern  portions,  the  rich  agricultural  lands 
of  which  Missourians  are  so  proud  lying  mainly  north  of  the  muddy,  lazy  stream. 
Where  the  river  first  touches  the  Kansas  line  there  is,  as  has  been  already 
intimated,  another  instance  of  marvelous  growth,  still  more  wonderful,  perhaps, 
than  the  progress  of  St.  Louis. 

Kansas  City,  the  young  colossus  bestriding  the  bold  and  irregular  bluffs  on  the 
southern  bank  of  the  Missouri  just  below  the  mouth  of  the  Kansas,  was,  in  1850, 
a  shabby  town,  vainly  struggling  upon  the  flats  by  the  river  side.  It  had  once 
been  a  station  for  the  wild  "bull- whackers,"  who  came  to  load  their'  "prairie 
schooners"  from  the  Missouri  river  boats;  and  even  several  years  afterward  it 
was  graceless  enough  to  be  thus  touchingly  characterized  by  one  of  the  rude 
men  of  the  frontier :  "  There  's  no  railroad  west  of  Junction  City,  no  law  west  of 
Kansas  City,  and  no  God  west  of  Hays'  City."  During  the  war  the  forlorn  and 
remote  town  suffered  all  kinds  of  evils;  but  in  1865  the  Missouri  Pacific  railroad 
reached  it.  Then  it  sprang  up !  It  is  now  the  terminus  of  nine  splendid  railroads, 
which  stretch  out  their  long  arms  over  Kansas,  Missouri,  across  the  great  desert 
to  Colorado,  give  direct  connection  with  Omaha,  Chicago  and  the  North,  and 
tap  Texas  and  her  newly  developed  fields. 

The  city  seems  to  have  sprung  out  of  the  ground  by  magic.  Upon  its  scraggy 
bluffs,  pierced  in  all  directions  by  railroad  tracks,  more  than  40,000  people  have 
settled,  and  built  miles  of  elegant  streets,  lined  with  fine  warehouses,  school  and 
church  edifices.  They  have  bridged  the  Missouri,  erected  massive  depots  and 
stock-yards,  fine  hotels  and  many  princely  residences,  and  have  two  of  the  best 
newspapers  in  the  North-west.  They  control  the  market  from  the  Missouri  river 
to  the  Rocky  Mountains,  have  a  valuation  of  $42,000,000,  instead  of  the  $1,000, 
000  which  they  boasted  twelve  years  ago.  The  jobbing  trade  of  the  city  alone 
amounts  to  $17,000,000.  The  aggregate  deposits  in  the  banking  institutions  in 
1872  reached  $72,000,000.  Eighty  railway  trains  arrive  and  depart  from  the 
crowded  depots  daily.  During  the  last  seven  months  of  1871,  200,000  cattle 
were  received  in  its  stock-yards.  More  beef  is  packed  there  than  in  any  other 
city  in  the  United  States. 

In  the  lower  town,  which  lies  down  close  to  the  Kansas  line  (a  portion  of  it, 
indeed,  being  in  Kansas),  one  sees  throngs  of  drovers  and  cattle-dealers ;  clouds 
of  dust  arise  in  the  wake  of  the  bellowing  and  plunging  herds  in  transit ;  there  is 
a  lively  stock-market,  where  hundreds  of  persons  are  buzzing  about  from  sunrise 
until  sunset;  and  the  railway  lines  through  the  streets  are  so  numerous  that  a 
stranger's  life  is  constantly  in  danger.  Four  great  packing-houses  have  facilities 
for  dressing  2,000  cattle  daily;  the  spectacle  within  their  vast  interiors,  where 
hundreds  of  grimy  and  bloody  butchers  dexterously  rend  the  vitals  of  the 
animals,  and  convert  their  flesh  into  carefully  cured  and  packed  provisions,  being 
as  imposing  as  it  is  disagreeable.  In  1872  more  than  20,000  cattle  and  120,000 
swine  passed  through  the  hands  of  Kansas  City  butchers. 

As  the  eastern  terminus  of  the  great  Texan  cattle  roads  of  the  West  alone, 
Kansas  City  can  become  one  of  the  largest  cities  in  the  West.     It  is  a  busy, 


252  PECULIARITIES     AND     NEEDS     OF      MISSOURI. 

bustling  town,  in  whose  streets  the  elegantly  dressed  business  man  jostles  the 
slouching,  unkempt  farmer  from  the  back-country ;  where  the  hearty  currents  of 
frontier  rudeness  meet  and  mingle  with  the  smoothly- flowing  and  resistless 
streams  of  business  civilization.  Energy  is  necessary — for,  when  a  new  street  is 
to  be  laid  out,  a  bluff  has  to  be  leveled ;  the  town  has  only  been  fastened  to  its 
place  by  sheer  audacity  and  tremendous  pluck.  Thousands  of  Germans  and 
Jews  have  settled  in  all  the  region  round  about. 

The  hard  riding,  hard  drinking,  blustering  Missourian,  who  carries  bowie- 
knife  and  revolver — the  type  of  those  adventurous  knights  who  used  to  amuse 
themselves  by  crusading  into  Kansas,  and  committing  "  border-ruffian  "  outrages, 
is  rarely  to  be  seen ;  and  when  one  of  them  finds  himself  by  accident  in  the  roar- 
ing, trafficking  town,  he  feels  so  uncomfortably  out  of  place  that  he  immediately 
turns  his  horse's  head  toward  the  open  country  again.  Where  in  i860  there  was 
nothing  but  a  desolate  moor,  now  stands  a  depot  through  which  1,000,000  people 
annually  pass.  In  twenty  years  Kansas  City  will  become  one  of  the  great 
manufacturing  centres  of  the  country. 

The  influence  and  mark  of  Southern  manners  have  vanished  from  the  north- 
western sections  of  Missouri.  A  new  type  has  arisen,  and  swept  out  of  sight 
those  who  prevailed  "  befo'  the  waw."  The  same  remark  may  be  made  of  St. 
Louis.  Once  a  thoroughly  Southern  city  in  all  its  attributes,  it  is  now  cosmo- 
politan. In  the  northern  and  north-western  portions  of  the  State  there  are  large 
numbers  of  New  England  people ;  the  tone  of  society  and  manners  is  a  curious 
mixture  of  Colorado  and  Maine.  In  some  of  the  counties  there  is  wild  life,  and 
the  enforcement  of  law  is  rather  difficult ;  but  such  counties  are  the  exceptions. 
The  Missouri  farmers  can  never  allow  a  court  to  try  a  horse-thief;  they  always 
give  him  short  shrift.  Popular  justice  is  very  healthful  in  many  instances,  and 
keeps  down  future  rascality. 

Population  is  the  prime  need  of  Missouri.  The  agricultural  resources  of  the 
State  are  immense.  The  river-bottoms  along  the  Missouri  are  as  rich  as  the 
valley  of  the  Nile.  In  journeying  beside  them  on  the  Missouri  Pacific  railroad 
one  sees  immense  spaces  but  recently  cleared  of  forests,  dotted  with  log-cabins, 
and  barns  and  their  omnipresent  appendages,  the  hog-yards  filled  with  dozens  of 
swine ;  yellow  corn-fields,  acres  on  acres,  extending  as  far  as  the  eye  can  reach 
among  the  girdled  trees ;  men  and  women  cantering  to  market  on  bareback 
horses,  and  grimy  children  staring  from  the  zig-zag  fences. 

The  life  is  like  the  products  of  the  soil,  dusty  and  coarse ;  there  is  a  flavor  of 
corn  and  pork  about  it,  but  it  is  full  of  vigor.  The  country  north  of  the  Missouri 
river  is  rich,  undulating  prairie,  watered  by  abundant  streams.  The  Platte 
country  is  famous  for  hemp,  grain,  and  superb  stock ;  and,  indeed,  there  is  no 
section  of  Missouri  which  is  not  well  adapted  to  stock-raising.  The  climate  is  so 
mild  that  there  is  rarely  any  necessity  of  ^shelter  for  stock  in  the  winter.  The 
State  is  covered  with  a  network  of  small  streams ;  the  grasses  everywhere  are 
rich,  and  grain  crops  are  unfailing.  Countless  swine,  sheep  and  cattle  now  roam 
over  the  vast  swelling  prairies ;  the  swine,  I  am  sorry  to  say,  roaming  with  equal 
freedom  in  the  streets  of  most  of  the  towns.     Immense  tracts  of  good  land  south 


THE      MISSOURI      FORESTS NEW     TOWNS.  253 

of  the  Osage  river — a  grand  section  for  vineyards,  sheep-farms,  and  fruit — can 
be  had  for  from  fifty  cents  to  five  dollars  per  acre.  The  bottom  lands  along  the 
Mississippi  river  are  very  rich,  and  are  all  capable  of  cultivation.  The  staple 
products  of  the  State  —  Indian  com,  wheat,  rye,  oats,  barley,  buckwheat,  potatoes, 
tobacco,  hay,  grapes,  wool  and  hemp* — grow  luxuriantly  and  yield  largely,  f 

The  foliage  of  the  Missouri  forests  is  exquisitely  beautiful.  The  timber-lines 
along  the  creeks,  and  the  great  woods,  covering  hundreds  of  acres,  are  alike 
charming.  Even  in  sections  where  there  has  been  no  cultivation,  one  finds 
delicious  lawns  shaded  by  trees,  as  graceful  and  luxuriant  as  if  the  product  of 
the  care  of  centuries. 

The  sycamores  and  oaks  are  of  marvelous  height,  sometimes  measuring  130 
or  140  feet,  and  on  all  the  forest  monarchs  hang  graceful  festoons  of  wild  grape- 
vines, the  trumpet-flower,  and  many  pretty  winding  parasites.  In  the  south-east 
of  the  State  are  enormous,  groves  of  yellow  pine,  in  whose  aisles  wild  animals 
still  stalk  fearlessly.  But  the  woodman's  axe  is  rapidly  annihilating  all  these 
beautiful  sylvan  retreats. 

In  journeying  across  the  State  along  the  line  of  the  Kansas  City  and  North- 
ern railroad,  I  found  many  little  towns  of  the  same  unsubstantial  outward 
appearance  as  those  I  had  seen  in  South-western  Missouri  during  our  journey 
Texas- ward.  The  little  villages  seemed  like  those  toy  ones  we  play  with  in 
childhood,  and  were  all  of  one  general  plan.  "Saloon — Wines  and  Liquors"  is 
always  a  conspicuous  sign  ;  and  the  hum  and  bustle  of  the  town  centres  about 
the  depot. 

Such  places  are  the  outgrowth  of  the  railway ;  but  the  older  towns  are  more 
substantial  and  interesting.  Lexington,  Moberly  and  Mexico  are  flourishing 
communities  in  the  midst  of  fertile  regions.  St.  Joseph  is  perhaps  the  most 
attractive,  as  it  is  the  largest,  in  North-western  Missouri.  In  aspect  it  is  a  New 
England  town,  and  is  built  on  hills  along  the  Missouri  river — hills  which  slope 
gently  away  until  they  reach  rich  prairies  extending  over  thousands  of  acres. 
The  sum  total  of  its  wholesale  and  retail  trade  averages  $25,000,000  annually. 
It  has  costly  hotels,  theatres,  churches,  residences,  a  mammoth  bridge  across  the 
great  river, — and  25,000  inhabitants.  From  St.  Joseph  a  railroad  stretches 
across  the  State  to  Hannibal,  another  thriving  city. 

But  this  is  digression.  These  cities  properly  belong  to  the  North-west, 
whose  spirit  they  manifest,  and  whose  manners  and  energy  they  represent.  St. 
Louis  and  the  country  tributary  to  it,  however,  are  Southern  in  interest,  and 
must  so  remain.  St.  Louis  will  become  one  of  the  greatest  clearing-houses  of 
the  South.  Its  interests  are  allied  with  those  of  Texas,  Arkansas,  the  Indian 
Territory,  and  the  Mississippi  valley.  Its  rolling-mills  must  make  rails  with 
which  to  lay  Southern  railroads,  and  its  capital '  must  build  mills  in  which  to 
manufacture  Southern  cotton. 

*  In  1870  Missouri  produced  nearly  4,000,000  pounds  of  wool;  more  than  1,000,000  pounds 
of  honey;  sorghum  to  the  amount  of  1,731,000  gallons,  and  1,000,000  gallons  of  wine. 

t  There  are  at  present  more  than  150,000  farm's  in  Missouri,  and  there  is  ample  room  for  five 
times  as  many  more. 


254 


ST.  CHARLES ST.   GENEVIEVE  —  THE  GREAT  SWAMP. 


Along  the  Atlantic  and  Pacific  railway  line  must  come  a  trade  which  will 
build  St.  Louis  marvelously  fast.  Pierce  City,  Joplin,  and  dozens  of  other  small 
towns,  will  become  wealthy  and  important.  Springfield,  now  pioneering  in 
cotton  manufacture,  will  be  a  great  spindle  centre,  like  Lowell  or  Lawrence. 

St.  Charles,  the  little  town  nestled  at  the  junction  of  the  Missouri  and  Mis- 
sissippi rivers,  looks  charmingly  picturesque  seen  from  the  high  bridge  over  the 
Missouri.  The  houses  are  nearly  all  German  in  architecture,  and  their  low, 
broad,  sloping  roofs  are  huddled  into  artistic  groups.  A  few  steamers  lie  at  the 
levee,  others  drift  lazily  along  the  broad,  sheeny  tide,  between  the  rich  green 
banks.  The  pretty  town  is  really  older  than  St.  Louis,  for  as  "Village  des 
Cotes"  it  was  settled  two  years  before  Laclede  visited  the  site  of  St.  Louis,  and 
was  once  the  seat  of  the  State  government,  before  the  legislators  betook  them- 
selves to  the  rather  prosaic  Jefferson  City. 

Sainte  Genevieve  is  another  romantic  old  town,  and  a  few  venerable  French- 
men, lingering  on  the  edge  of  these  moving  times,  give  many  stories  of  the  good 
old  days  when  the  trappers  and  voyageurs  made  it  a  rendezvous,  and  the  people 
of  St.  Louis  came  there  to  buy  provisions.  They  cannot  comprehend  the  grand 
movement  which  has  made  St.  Louis  a  metropolis,  and  left  their  village  to  its 
primitive  quiet.  They  see  hundreds  of  steamers  and  barges  slip  down  the  broad 
current,  and  it  seems  to  them  all  a  dream. 

There  are  many  pretty,  and  some  prosperous  towns  along  the  Mississippi,  on 
the  Missouri  shore,  between  St.  Louis  and  the  section  opposite  the  Ohio's  mouth. 
St.  Mary's,  Wittenberg,  Cape  Girardeau,  are  thriving  settlements,  indicating  a 
vigorous  growth  in  the  back-country,  whence  come  rough  farmers,  mounted  on 

tough  horses,  to  see  the 


boats  come  in,  to  get  the 
mails,  and,  mayhap,  a  little 
whiskey. 

Southward  of  Cape  Gi- 
rardeau begins  the  "  Great 
Swamp," — a  magnificent 
wilderness,  extending  to 
the  mouth  of  the  St. 
Francis  river,  a  region 
picturesque  enough  in  its 
wildness  and  desolation  as 
I  saw  it,  when  the  giant 
stream  had  overflowed  all 
the  lowlands,  and  left  noth- 

The  Missouri  Capitol,  at  Jefferson  City.  jng  visible    but    a    half-SUb- 

merged  forest.  Cape  Girardeau  lies  on  a  solid  bed  of  marble,  and  is  called  the 
Marble  City.  New  Madrid,  a  small  and  unimposing  town  in  the  south-eastern 
portion  of  the  State,  and  on  the  river,  was  the  scene  of  the  colossal  earthquake 
in  1 8 1 1 ,  when  the  whole  land  was  moved  and  swayed  like  the  ocean,  and  the 
tallest  oaks  bent  like  reeds. 


THE      EARNESTNESS     OF      MISSOURI JEFFERSON      CITY. 


255 


There  are  but  four  States  in  the  Union  which  out-rank  Missouri  in  the 
amount  of  manufacturing  done  within  their  limits.  Those  States  are  New  York, 
Pennsylvania,  Massachusetts,  and  Ohio.  It  is  true  that  Missouri  and  Illinois 
are  so  closely  abreast  that  the  supremacy  is  keenly  disputed.  The  rate  per 
cent,  of  increase  in  Missouri  has,  however,  been  394  since  the  war,  while  that  in 
Illinois  has  been  but  257. 

There  is  an  earnestness  in  the  manner  in  which  the  Missourian  declares  his 
determination  to  place  his  State  at  the  head  of  all  others,  which  almost  convinces 
one  that  he  will  do  it.  The  cash  value  of  the  farm  lands  in  the  State  is  fully  four 
hundred  million  dollars,  and  is  steadily  increasing.  In  1872  the  State  produced 
almost  one  hundred  million  bushels  of  corn,  nearly  eight  million  bushels  of  wheat, 
and  seventeen  million  bushels  of  oats..  So  uniting  agriculture  and  the  rapid 
development   of   manufactures,  Missouri    has   a  wonderful  future    before   her. 


"The  Cheery  Minstrel."      fPage  256. J 

St.  Louis  certainly  has  considerably  more  than  four  hundred  thousand  inhab- 
itants ;  the  citizens  claim  450,000,  and,  indeed,  it  is  not  improbable,  judging  from 
the  rapidity  with  which  the  currents  of  immigration  pour  into  it  and  through 
it.  The  people  of  Missouri  have  wisely  left  their  capital  in  a  small  town, 
never  entrusting  it  to  the  influences  of  a  large  metropolis,  and  at  Jefferson  City  a 
legislature  assembles,  which  is  usually,  though  not  always,  up  to  the  level  of  the 
State's  progress.  Jefferson  City  itself  is  a  prosperous  town  of  seven  thousand 
inhabitants,  situated  on  the  south  bank  of  the  Missouri  river,  125  miles  west 
of  St.  Louis.  It  has  been  the  capital  since  1828,  the  seat  of  government 
having  previously  been  rather  peripatetic,  making  visits  to  St.  Louis,  St.  Charles, 
and  Marion. 

17 


256  THE     STATE    HOUSE — A     TRAVELING      MINSTREL. 

The  State- House  occupies  a  bluff  overhanging  the  river;  the  handsome  resi- 
dence of  the  governor,  a  crowded  penitentiary,  the  Lincoln  Institute,  and  the 
Court- House  are  the  other  public  buildings.  There  is  abundant  and  admirable 
limestone  in  the  vicinity,  and  this  alone,  so  well  adapted  to  the  construction  of 
serviceable  public  buildings,  may  induce  the  Missourians  to  locate  the  capital 
permanently  at  "Jefferson."  The  Democrats  have  been  for  some  time  in  power, 
and  have  distinguished  themselves  rather  by  a  lack  of  progressive  legislation  than 
by  any  tendency  to  undo  the  advance  already  made. 

The  State  withheld  itself  from  the  cause  of  secession,  and  the  memorable 
phrase  of  Governor  Stewart,  in  his  valedictory  in  1861,  shows  the  independence 
and  good  sense  of  the  masses  in  the  commonwealth:  "Missouri  will  hold  to  the 
Union  so  long  as  it  is  worth  the  effort  to.  preserve  it.  She  cannot  be  frightened 
by  the  past  unfriendly  legislation  of  the  North,  nor  dragooned  into  secession  by 
the  restrictive  legislation  of  the  extreme  South."  To-day  the  best  spirit  prevails; 
old  enemies  work  in  the  upbuilding  side  by  side,  and  the  animosities  of  the 
past  are  buried  under  the  impressive  and  fascinating  opportunities  of  the 
present. 

The  cheery  minstrel,  whose  portrait  our  artist  has  given,  makes  music  on 
the  cars  between  St.  Louis  and  the  State  capital.  He  is  one  of  the  celebrities 
of  Missouri,  known  to  thousands  of  the  traveling  public,  and  when  the  Legisla- 
ture is  in  session,  and  the  tide  of  travel  is  strong,  coins  many  an  honest  penny, 
the  fruit  of  much  manipulation  of  harmonicon  and  triangle. 


XXVI. 


DOWN     THE     MISSISSIPPI     FROM      ST.      LOUIS. 

"  O,  starboard  side  !" 

"  Oo-le-oo-le-oo  !" 

"  Nudder  one  down  dar  !" 

THE  roustabouts  were  loading  sacks  of  corn  from  one  of  the  immense 
elevators  at  East  St.  Louis  into  the  recesses  of  that  mammoth  steam- 
boat, the  "  Great  Republic,"  and  singing  at  their  toil.  Very  lustily  had  they 
worked,  these  grimy  and  uncouth  men  and  boys,  clad  in  soiled  and  ragged 
garments,  from  early  morning,  and  it  was  full  midnight  as  we  stood  listening  to 
their  song.  In  their  voices,  and  in  the  characteristic  wail  with  which  each  refrain 
ended,  there  was  a  kind  of  grim  passion,  not  unmixed  with  religious  fervor. 
The  singers'  tones  seemed  to  sink  into  a  lament,  as  if  in  despair  at  faulty  expres- 


The  Steamer  "Great  Republic,"  a  Mississippi  River  Boat. 

sion.  But  the  music  kept  them  steadily  at  their  work, — tugging  at  the  coarse, 
heavy  sacks,  while  the  rain  poured  down  in  torrents.  The  "torch -baskets"  sent 
forth  their  cheery  light  and  crackle,  and  the  heat-lightning,  so  terrible  in  Mis- 
souri, now  and  then  disclosed  to  those  of  us  still  awake  the  slumbering  city,  with 


258 


TWELVE   HUNDRED   MILES   BY  WATER. 


"Down  the  steep  banks 
would  come  kaleidoscopic 
processions  of  negroes  and 
flour  barrels."  [Page  259.] 


its    myriad    lights,    and    its    sloping    hills    packed    with  dark,    smoke-discolored 

houses,  beyond  the  river. 

Toward  morning,  the  great  steamer  turned  swiftly  round,  the  very  spray  from 

the  boiling  water  seeming  crowded  with  oaths,  as  the  officers  drove  the  negroes 

to  their  several  tasks;  and  the  "  Great  Republic "  glided  slowly,  and  with  scarcely 

a  perceptible  motion,  down  the  stream.     The  blinking  lights  of  the  ferries  behind 

us  faded  into  distance.     We  passed  tug-boats  fuming  and  growling  like  monsters, 

drawing  after  them 

mysterious  trains  of 

barges;    and  finally 

entered    upon    the 

solitude   which   one 

finds   so    impressive 

upon  the  Mississippi. 
A   journey    of 

1,200  miles  by  water 

was  before  us.     We  . 

were    sailing  from 

the    treacherous, 

transition  weather 

of  Missourian  March 

to  meet  loveliest 

summer   robed    in 

green,    and   garlanded  with  fairest 

blooms.      The   thought  was  inspiring. 

Eight  days  of  this  restful  sailing  on  the 

gently -throbbing    current,    and    we 

should  see  the  lowlands,  the  Cherokee 

rose,  the   jessamine,  .the  orange-tree.      Wakeful  and 

pacing  the  deck,  across  which  blew  a  chill  breeze, 

with  my  Ulster  close  about  me,  I  pondered   upon 

my  journey  and  the  journey's  end. 

The  "Great  Republic"  is  the  largest  steamer  on 
the  Mississippi  river, — literally  a  floating  palace. 
The  luxuriantly  furnished  cabin  is  almost  as  long  and 
quite  as  ample  as  the  promenade  hall  in  the  Hom- 
bourg  Kursaal,  and  has  accommodations  for  200 
guests.  Standing  on  the  upper  deck  or  in  the  pilot- 
house, one  fancies  the  graceful  structure  to  be  at  rest,  even  when  going  at  full 
speed.  This  is  the  very  luxury  of  travel.  An  army  of  servants  come  and  go. 
As  in  an  ocean  voyage,  breakfast,  dinner  and  tea  succeed  each  other  so  quickly 
that  one  regrets  the  rapid  flight  of  the  hours.  In  the  evening  there  is  the 
blaze  of  the  chandeliers,  the  opened  piano,  a  colored  band  grouped  around  it  and 
playing  tasteful  music  while  the  youths  and  maidens  dance.  If  the  weather 
is  warm,  there  are  trips  about  the  moonlit  wilderness  of  decks — and  flirtations. 


NEGRO 


ROUSTABOUTS THE     MOUTH      OF     THE      OHIO. 


259 


The  two-score  negro  "  roustabouts "  on  the  boat  were  sources  of  infinite 
amusement  to  the  passengers.  At  the  small  landings  the  "  Great  Republic  " 
would  lower  her  gang-planks,  and  down  the  steep  banks  would  come  kaleido- 
scopic processions  of  negroes  and  flour  barrels.  The  pilots,  perched  in  their  cosy- 
cage,  twisted  the  wheel,  and  told  us  strange  stories.  Romantic  enough  were 
their  accounts  of  the  adventures  of  steamers  in  war  time, — how  they  ran  the 
gauntlet  here,  and  were  seized  there ;  and  how,  now  and  then,  Confederate 
shells  came  crashing  uncomfortably  near  the  pilots  themselves.  The  pilots  on 
the  Western  rivers  have  an  association,  with  head-quarters  at  St.  Louis,  and 
branches  at  Louisville,  Pittsburg,  and  Cincinnati.  Each  of  the  seventy-four 
members,  on  his  trip,  makes  a  report  of  changes  in  the  channel,  or  obstructions, 
which  is  forwarded  from  point  to  point  to  all  the  others.  They  are  men  of  great 
energy,  of  quaint,  dry  humor,  and  fond  of  spinning  yarns.  The  genial  "  Mark. 
Twain"  served  his  apprenticeship  as  pilot,  and  one  of  his  old  companions  and 
tutors,  now  on  the  "  Great  Republic,"  gave  us  reminiscences  of  the  humorist. 
One  sees,  on  a  journey  down  the  Mississippi,  where  Mark  found  many  of  his 
queerest  and  seemingly  impossible  types. 

Our  first  night  on  the  river  was  so  extremely  dark  that  the  captain  made  fast 
to  a  shelving  bank,  and  the  "  Great  Republic  "  laid  by  till  early  dawn.     Then 


The  Levee  at  Cairo,  Illinois. 


we  sailed  down  past  the  fertile  bottom  lands  of  Missouri  and  Illinois,  past  Grand 
Tower,  with  its  furnaces  and  crowded  villages,  past  the  great  cypress  swamps 
and  the  wooded  lands,  until  we  came  to  Cairo,  in  Illinois,  at  the  junction  of  the 
Ohio  and  Mississippi.      One  broad  lake    spread  a  placid  sheet  above    the   flat 


260 


THE     MISSISSIPPI     AS     A     DESTROYER. 


country  at  the  Ohio's  mouth.  The  "Great  Eastern"  might  have  swung  round 
in  front  of  the  Illinois  Central  tracks  at  Cairo.  Stopping  but.  to  load  more  bags 
of  corn  and  hogsheads  of  bacon,  with  hundreds  of  clamorous  fowls,  we  turned, 
and  once  more  entered  the  giant  river,  which  was  then  beginning  to  show  a 
determination  to  overflow  all  proper  bounds,  and  invade  the  lands  upon  its  banks. 


An  Inundated  Town  on  the  Mississippi's  Bank. 


When  the  rains  have  swollen  its  tributary  rivers  to  more  than  their  ordinary 
volume,  the  Mississippi  is  grand,  terrible,  treacherous.  Always  subtle  and 
serpent-like  in  its  mode  of  stealing  upon  its  prey,  it  swallows  up  acres  at  one  fell 
swoop ;  on  one  side  sweeping  them  away  from  their  frail  hold  on  the  main  land, 
while,  on  the  other,  it  covers  plantations  with  slime,  and  broken  tree  trunks  and 
boughs,  forcing  the  frightened  inhabitants  into  the  second  story  of  their  cabins, 
and  driving  the  cattle  and  swine  upon  high  knolls  to  starve,  or  perhaps  finally  to 
drown.  It  pierces  the  puny  levees  which  have  cost  the  States  bordering  upon  it 
such  immense  sums,  and  goes  bubbling  and  roaring  through  the  crevasses,  dis- 
tracting the  planters,  and  sending  dismay  to  millions  of  people  in  a  single  night. 
It  promises  a  fall  on  one  day ;  on  another  it  rises  so  suddenly  that  the  adventur- 
ous woodmen  along  the  border  have  scarcely  time  to  flee.  It  makes  a  lake  of 
the  fertile  country  between  the  two  great  rivers ;  it  carries  off  hundreds  of  wood- 
piles, which  lonely  and  patient  labor  has  heaped,  in  the  hope  that  a  passing 
steamer  will  buy  them  up,  and  thus  reward  a  season's  work.  Out  of  each  small 
town  on  its  western  bank  set  too  carelessly  by  the  water's  edge,  it  makes  a  pigmy 
Venice,  or  floats  it  off  altogether.  As  the  huge  steamer  glided  along  on  the 
mighty  current,  we  could  see  families  perched  in  the  second  stories  of  their  houses, 
gazing  grimly  out  upon  the  approaching  ruin.  At  one  point  a  man  was  sculling 
from  house  to  barn-yard  with  food  for  his  stock.  The  log  barn  was  a  dreary 
pile  in  the  midst  of  the  flood.  The  swine  and  cows  stood  shivering  on  a  pine 
knoll,  disconsolately  burrowing  and  browsing.  Hailed  by  some  flustered  pater- 
familias or  plantation  master  bound  to  the  nearest  town  for  supplies,  we  took  him 
to  his  destination.  As  we  got  below  the  Arkansas  and  White  rivers,  the  gigantic 
volume  of  water  had  so  far  overrun  its  natural  boundaries  that  we  seemed  at  sea, 
instead  of  upon  an  inland  river.     The  cottonwoods  and  cypresses  stood  up  amid 


CHARACTERISTICS      OF      THE      "FATHER     OF     WATERS." 


26l 


the  water  wilderness  like  ghosts.  Gazing  into  the  long  avenues  of  the  sombre 
forests,  we  could  see  only  the  same  level,  all-enveloping  flood.  In  the  open 
country  the  cabins  seemed  ready  to  sail  away,  though  their  masters  were  usually 
smoking  with  much  equanimity,  and  awaiting  a  "fall." 

While  we  .are  gossiping  of  the  river,  let  us  consider  its  peculiarities  and  the 
danger  of  its  inundations  more  fully.  Below  the  mouth  of  the  Missouri,  the 
great  river  takes  a  wholly  different  appearance  and  character  from  those  of  the 
lovely  stream  which  stretches  from  Lake  Pepin  down ;  and  some  of  the  old  pilots 
say  that  section  of  it  below  St.  Louis  should  have  been  called  the  "Missouri" 
rather  than  the  Mississippi.  The  Missouri,  they  claim,  gives  to  the  Father  of 
Waters  most  of  the  characteristics  which  dominate  it  until  it  has  been  reinforced 


The  Pilot -House  of  the   "Great  Republic."       [Page  259.] 

by  the  Ohio,  the  Arkansas,  the  White  and  the  Red.  The  river  is  forever  making 
land  on  one  side,  and  tearing  it  away  on  the  other,  the  bends  in  its  course  not 
permitting  the  current  to  wash  both  banks  with  equal  force.  The  farmer  on  the 
alluvial  bottoms  sees  with  dismay  his  corn-field  diminish  year  by  year,  acres  slip- 
ping into  the  dark  current ;  yet  the  ease  with  which  corn,  cotton  and  sugar  are 
raised  in  their  respective  localities  along  its  banks  is  such  that  they  willingly  run 
the  risk.  The  pilots  complain  bitterly  of  the  constant  changes  in  the  channel, 
which  it  requires  the  eyes  of  Argus  almost  to  detect.  •  They  say  that  the  current 
might  be  made  to  bear  more  upon  the  rocky  shores,  thus  avoiding  disastrous 
losses  of  land  and  many   "  crevasses,"  as  the  gaps  made  in  the  levees  by  the 


262 


THE      GENERAL      COURSE      OF      THE      LOWER      MISSISSIPPI      RIVER. 


encroaching  water  are  called.  The  stream  is  so  crooked  that  a  twenty  miles 
sail  by  water  is  sometimes  necessary  where  the  distance  across  the  promontory, 
round  which  the  steamer  must  go,  is  not  more  than  a  mile.  Sometimes  the 
current,  tired  of  the  detour,  itself  brushes  away  the  promontory,  and  the 
astonished  pilots  see  a  totally  new  course  opened  before  them.     .     , 

The  occasional  inundations  of  the  alluvial  lands  are  so  little  understood,  and 
the  general  course  of  the  Mississippi  is  comprehended  by  so  few,  that  a  little  idea 
of  its  progress  downward  to  the  Delta  country  may  prove  interesting. 

At  the  junction  of  the  Mississippi  and  Missouri  rivers  properly  begins  what  is 
known  as  the  Lower  Mississippi,  although  the  name  is  not  usually  applied  to  the 
stream  until  it  has  crossed  the  grand  "  rocky  chain"  or  bed  extending  across  its 
channel  between  St.  Louis  and  Cairo.  All  below  this  "chain,"  in  the  Mississippi 
valley,  is  alluvium,  through  which  the  river  meanders  from  one  bluff  to  another 
— the  bluffs  being  from  forty  to  one  hundred  miles  apart.  Touching  these  bluffs 
at  Commerce,  -Missouri,  on  the  west  bank,  it  courses  across  the  valley,  passing 
the  vast  prairies  of  Lower  Illinois,  known  as  "  Egypt,"  on  the  east,  meets  the 
Ohio  at  Cairo,  then  strikes  the  bluffs  again  at  Columbus,  on  the  eastern  or 
Kentucky  shore.  It  skirts  these  bluffs  as  far  as  Memphis,  having  on  its  west  the 
broad  earthquake  lands  of  Missouri  and  Arkansas.  It  then  once  more  crosses  its 
valley  to  meet  the  waters  of  the  White  and  Arkansas  rivers,  and  skirts  the  bluffs 
at  Helena  in  Arkansas,  flanking  and  hemming  in  the  St.  Francis  with  her 
swamps  and  "sunk  lands."  Reinforced  by  the  White  and  Arkansas,  it  again 
crosses  its  valley  to  meet  the  Yazoo  near  Vicksburg,  creating  the  immense 
Yazoo,  reservoir  on  the  east  bank,  extending  from  the  vicinity  of  Memphis  to 
Vicksburg,  and  the  valleys  and  swamps  of  the  Macon  and  Tensas,  on  the  west 
side.  These  latter  have  no  terminus  save  the  Gulf  of  Mexico,  as  the  river  does 
not  approach  the  western  bluffs  after  leaving  Helena.  From  Vicksburg  to  Baton 
Rouge  the  river  hugs  the  eastern  bluffs,  and  from  Baton  Rouge  to  the  mouth  is 

the  pure   "  delta  country,"  for  a  dis- 
tance of   more    than    200    miles. 

All  of  this  valley  below  the  rocky 
chain  crossing  the  river  channel  lies 
lower  than  the  high  water  line  of 
this  powerful  current,  and  the  efforts 
of  men  to  stay  an  inundation  seem 
very  puerile.  The  valley  is  divided 
into  several  natural  districts,  one  em- 
bracing the  lands  from  the  chain  to 
the  vicinity  of  Helena,  where  the  St. 
Francis  debouches;  another  from 
Helena  nearly  to  Vicksburg  on  the 
east  bank,  for  the  Yazoo  valley;  a 
third  comprises  the  country  from  the  Arkansas  to  the  Red  river,  known  as  the 
Macon  and  Tensas  valley ;  a  fourth  runs  from  the  Red  river  to  the  Gulf,  on 
the  west  side ;  and  a  fifth  from  Baton  Rouge  to  the  Gulf  on  the  east  side. 


A  Crevasse  in  the  Mississippi  River's  Banks. 


LEVEES     AND      INUNDATIONS.  263 

Some  of  these  districts  have  been  imperfectly. leveed;  others  have  never  been 
protected  at  all,  and  the  general  opinion  is  that  when  high  water  does  come  the 
fact  that  there  are  a  few  levees  increases  the  danger  of  a  complete  inundation,  as 
the  stream,  finding  itself  restrained,  breaks  the  barriers  which  attempt  to  control 
its  current.  Under  the  slave  system,  the  planters  on  the  lowlands  were  able  to 
guard  against  ruin  by  water  by  elaborate  preparation  and  vigilance,  which  they 
cannot  summon  now;  and  it  is  believed  that  nothing  but  the  execution  of  a 
grand  national  work  by  the  General  Government  will  ever  secure  to  the  delta 
that  immunity  from  ruin  so  desirable  for  people  already  savagely  stripped  by  war 
and  political  knavery. 

Yet  the  inundations  do  not  come  with  alarming  frequency.  In  1867  the 
lowlands  were  overflowed  and  distress  ensued;  and  in  this  year,  1874,  the 
confusion,  distress,  and  trepidation  have  been  terrible  to  witness.  Starvation  has 
stood  at  thousands  of  doors,  and  only  the  hands  of  the  Government  and  charity 
have  saved  hundreds  from  miserable  deaths.  Below  Memphis,  and  in  a  wide  belt 
of  country  round  about,  along  the  bottom  lands  in  the  State  of  Mississippi,  and 
throughout  the  Louisiana  lowlands,  there  has  been  immense  damage.  In  an  hour 
the  planter  is  doomed  to  see  a  thousand  acres,  which  have  been  carefully  pre- 
pared for  planting  cotton,  covered  with  water  two  or  three  feet  deep.  The 
country  round  about  becomes  a  swamp — the  roads  are  rivers,  the  lakes  are  seas. 

As  the  Mississippi  valley,  south  and  north,  will  in  future  be  one  of  the  most 
populous  sections  of  the  American  Union,  and  as  the  great  network  of  rivers 
which  penetrate  to  the  Rocky  Mountains,  and  the  mighty  canons  of  the  Mau- 
vaises  Terres  are  so  well  adapted  for  commercial  highways ;  as  a  score  of  States 
and  Territories  border  on  the  Mississippi  alone,  why  should  not  the  National 
Government  at  once  undertake  the  control  and  care  of  the  stream  and  its  tribu- 
taries ? 


XXVII. 

MEMPHIS,      THE      CHIEF      CITY      OF      TENNESSEE — "ITS      TRADE      AND 

CHARACTER. 


PASSING  Columbus  and  Hickman, — two  thriving  towns  on  the  Kentucky 
shore, — and  the  ruins  of  the  fortifications  on  "  Island  Number  Ten,"  an 
island  rapidly  sinking  in  Mississippi's  insidious  embrace,  past  Fort  Pillow, 
now  rounding  bends  which  took  us  miles  out  of  our  way,  and  now  venturing 
through  "  cut-offs,"  made  by  the  sudden  action  of  the  resistless  flood,  we  skirted 
along  the  vast  desolate  Arkansas  shore,  reached  the  third  Chickasaw  bluff  on 
the  Tennessee  side,  and  saw  before  us  the  city  of  Memphis. 

Memphis  is  the  chief  city  of  Western  Tennessee,  and,  indeed,  of  the  whole 
State.     It  has  been  well  and  widely  .known  ever  since  the  five  thousand  acre 

tract  on  the  fourth  Chickasaw  bluff,  on 
which  the  town  now  stands,  came  into 
the  possession  of  Judge  Overton, 
Major  Winchester,  and  General  An- 
drew Jackson,  the  original  proprietors. 
From  the  river,  Memphis  presents 
quite  an  imposing  appearance,  stately 
piles  of  buildings  running  along  the 
bluff,  at  whose  foot  stretches  a  levee, 
similar  to  those  of  all  the  other  river 
towns.  Opposite  to  it,  on  the  west 
bank  of  the  Mississippi,  is  the  level 
line  of  the  Arkansas  bottom,  whose 
lowlands  are  often  submerged;  and 
from  a  ferry  station  at  Hopefield  a 
railroad  leads  to  Little  Rock,  the 
Arkansas  capital.  The  streets  of 
Memphis  are  broad,  regular,  and  lined 
with  handsome  buildings;  there  is  but 
one  drawback  to  their  perfection,  and 
that  is  a  wooden  pavement,  so 
badly  put  down,  and  so  poorly  cared 
for,  that  a  ride  over  it  in  an  omnibus 
is  almost  unendurable.  In  the  centre  of  the  town  is  an  exquisite  little  park, 
filled  with  delicate  foliage,  where  a  bust  of  Andrew  Jackson  frowns  upon 
the   tame    squirrels  frisking   around   it,  or  climbing  on  the   visitor's  shoulders 


View  in  the  City  Park  at  Memphis,  Tennessee. 


THE     HEALTH     OF     MEMPHIS.  265 

and  exploring  his  pockets  for  chestnuts.  Since  the  terrible  visitation  of 
yellow  fever  in  1873,  the  City  Government  has  made  most  extraordinary 
efforts  to  secure  perfect  drainage  and  cleanliness  in  the  streets ;  and  Memphis 
certainly  compares  favorably  in  this  respect  with  any  of  its  riparian  sisters, 
Northern  or  Southern.  On  the  avenues  leading  from  the  river  toward  the 
open  country  there  are  many  lovely  residences  surrounded  by  cool  and 
inviting  lawn,s ;  the  churches  and  school  buildings  are  handsome  and  numerous, 
and  there  is  an  air  of  activity  and  thrift  which  I  was  not  prepared  to  find 
manifested  after  the  severe  experiences  through  which  the  city  has  passed. 
Several  good  newspapers — the  Avalanche,  the  Appeal,  the  Ledger,  and  the 
Register,  do  much  to  enliven  Memphis  and  the  highly  prosperous  county  of 
Shelby,  in  which  it  stands ;  and  the  carnival  in  winter,  and  the  cotton  trade  until 
midsummer,  make  excitement  the  rule.  Those  who  fancied  Memphis  "  dead " 
after  the  yellow  fever's  ghastly  visitation  are  wrong;  the  number  of  business 
houses  in  the  city  has  increased  ten  per  cent,  since  that'  terrible  event,  the 
number  of  physicians,  curious  to  note,  decreasing  in  exactly  the  same  pro- 
portion. The  wholesale  trade  has  been  growing  enormously,  and  the  influx 
of  population  has  been  so  very  considerable,  that  Memphis  claims  to-day  about 
65,000  inhabitants.  Great  injustice  has  been  done  the  city  in  former  times  by 
the  false  statement  extensively  published  that,  after  Valparaiso  and  Prague, 
Memphis  had  the  highest  death-rate  in  the  world.  The  cemetery  on  the  Chick- 
asaw bluff,  besides  receiving  the  dead  of  the  city  itself,  serves  as  the  burial  place 
for  the  dead  of  all  the  migratory  multitudes  who  toil  up  and  down  the  currents 
of  the  half-dozen  giant  streams  which  bring  trade  and  people  to  Memphis. 
It  is  quite  probable,  whatever  appearances  may  indicate,  that  the  death- 
rate  of  Memphis  is  no  higher  than  that  of  any  city  in  the  central  valley  of  the 
Mississippi.  The  city  itself  occupies  a  tract  of  three  square  miles.  Opposite  it 
is  the  centre  of  a  district,  one  hundred  miles  square,  east  of  the  White  and 
St.  Francis  rivers  and  west  of  the  Mississippi,  which  has  been  for  ages  enriched 
by  the  alluvial  deposits  brought  down  by  the  mighty  river.  It  is  said  that  in  this 
area  there  are  5,000,000  acres,  each  one  of  which  is  capable  of  producing  annually 
a  bale  of  cotton.  This  plain,  says  a  local  writer,  "  was  the  rich  granary  of  the 
city  of  the  mound-builders,  once  occupying,  as  suggested  by  the  great  mounds 
on  the  city's  southern  confines,  the  heights  on  which  Memphis  stands."  North 
of  the  city  lies  the  famous  Big  Creek  section,  the  home  of  many  opulent  cotton- 
planters  before  the  war,  but  now  but  little  cultivated,  and  with  many  of  its  fine 
lands  deserted.  N 

Memphis  is  very  near  the  centre  of  the  cotton  belt,  and  has  an  enormous  sup- 
ply trade  with  Arkansas,  Mississippi,  Western  Tennessee,  and  Northern  Alabama. 
The  export  trade  of  inland  ports  like  Memphis,  Macon,  and  Augusta  has  become 
so  great  that  the  railroads  have  accorded  them  very  low  rates.  Much  of  the 
cotton  once  sent  to  New  Orleans  is  now  shipped  directly  across  the  country  to 
Norfolk.  The  railroad  system  of  Memphis  is  already  very  important — as 
follows:  The  Memphis  and  Charleston  road  extends  to  Stevenson  in  North  Ala- 
bama, and   connects  with   routes  to  Norfolk  and  the  sea,  as  well  as  with  those 


266  THE     COTTON     TRADE RAILWAY      CONNECTIONS. 

running  northward.  It  is  at  present  under  a  lease  to  the  Southern  Railway  Secur- 
ity Company,  but  it  is  expected  that  the  control  of  the  line  will  in  time  return  to 
the  stockholders.  Next  in  importance  is  the  Louisville  and  Nashville  and  Great 
Southern  railroad,  sometimes  called  the  Memphis  and  Ohio.  This  line  extends 
to  Paris,  Tennessee,  connecting  thence  to  Louisville,  Kentucky,  and  with  the 
Memphis  and  Clarkville  and  Louisville  and  Nashville  roads.  The  Mississippi 
and  Tennessee  road  extends  from  Memphis  to  Grenada,  a  smart  town  in  the 
former  State,  and  runs  through  an  excellent  cotton  -  raising,  although  thinly 
settled  country,  for  one  hundred  miles,  connecting  by  the  Mississippi  Central 
with  New  Orleans.  The  road  to  Little  Rock  gives  connection  with  the  network 
in  which  Texas  is  tangled ;  and  the  Memphis  and  Paducah,  only  partially 
completed,  will  give  almost  an  air- line  to  Chicago.  The  Memphis  and  Selma 
road  is  also  begun.  But  the  project  considered  of  most  importance  by  the 
citizens  of  Memphis  is  the  contemplated  road  from  Kansas  City  to  Memphis, 
which  would  render  the  latter  independent  of  and  in  direct  competition  with 
St.  Louis. 

The  cotton  trade  of  Memphis  represents  from  $35,000,000  to  $40,000,000, 
annually.  Its  growth  has  been  extraordinary.  In  1860-61  Memphis  received 
nearly  400,000  bales.  She  then  had  also  an  extensive  tobacco  trade,  which  the 
war  took  from  her,  and  which  has  never  been  returned.  After  the  war,  produc- 
tion was  so  crippled  that  there  was  but  a  gradual  return  to  the  old  figures  in  the 
cotton  trade,  as  shown  by  the  appended  table : 

Year.  Bales.  Year.  Bales. 


1867-68   254,240 

1868-69 247j698 

1869-70 247,654 

I870-7I 5U>432 


I87I-72 380,934 

1872-73 4H,955 

1873-74  up  to  April 398,637 


The  cotton  received  at  Memphis  comes  mainly  from  Western  Tennessee, 
Northern  and  Central  Alabama,  the  same  sections  of  Mississippi,  and  Arkansas,  as 
far  south  as  Chicot.  The  south-eastern  portion  of  Missouri  also  furnishes  some 
cotton  to  Memphis.  The  market  is  made  up  of  buyers  from  New  England 
and  the  Northern  spinning  element  generally,  and  from  Liverpool,  Manchester, 
and  the  continental  ports.  Nearly  one-third  of  the  receipts,  it  is  said,  are  now 
taken  by  foreign  shippers.  Of  course  most  of  those  purchases  go  to  Europe 
via  Norfolk,  New  York,  or  Boston,  but  one  German  buyer  this  season  shipped 
forty  thousand  bales  via  New  Orleans  and  the  Gulf.  The  character  of  the  cotton 
is  such  as  to  make  it  specially  sought  after  by  all  classes  of  spinners.  As  a  cotton- 
port  Memphis  is  independent  of  New  Orleans,  and  this  independence  has  been 
recently  achieved.  Of  the  entire  crop  brought  into  Memphis  in  1860-61  there 
were  184,366  bales  sent  to  the  Louisiana  metropolis:  whereas  in  1872-73  scarcely 
25,000  bales  were  sent  there  for  market.  The  prices  are  so  nearly  up  to  those 
of  New  Orleans  as  not  to  leave  a  margin.  The  Louisville  and  Nashville  road 
takes  a  great  deal  of  cotton  northward,  and  the  various  packet  lines  to  St.  Louis,  to 
Cairo,  to  Cincinnati,  Evansville,  and  Cannelton,  carry  many  hundreds  of  bales. 


COMMERCE NEGRO      SOCIETIES STEAMSHIP     LINES.  267 

There  are  so  many  lines  that  Memphis  is  never  blockaded.  As  a  single  item  of 
commerce,  that  of  cotton  is  enormous,  amounting,  at  an  average  estimate,  to 
something  like  $28,000,000.  It  is  calculated  that  the  whole  commerce  of  Mem- 
phis foots  up  $62,000,000  yearly.  Thousands  on  thousands  of  barrels  of  flour, 
pork,  bales  of  hay,  sacks  of  oats,  barrels  of  corn-meal,  are  brought  in  on  the 
Mississippi  river  and  thence  dispersed.  Besides  handling  one-eighth  of  the 
entire  cotton  crop  of  the  United  States,  Memphis  has  thus  far  kept  in  food 
as  well  as  in  courage  a  very  large  portion  of  the  half- discouraged  planters  of 
the  South  ;  her  merchants  having  made  great  efforts  to  accommodate  them- 
selves to  the  new  order  of  things.  So  changed  are  all  the  conditions  under 
which  planters  labor,  and  so  evident  is  it  that  the  character  of  planting  or 
farming  must  change  a  good  deal,  that  the  merchants  themselves  are  beginning 
to  doubt  the  real  beneficence  of  the  supply  system. 

Memphis  now  has  a  prosperous  Cotton  Exchange,  and  has  had  an  excellent 
Chamber  of*  Commerce  for  many  years.  Shelby  county  is  rich.  Its  people  were 
wont  to  grumble  about  taxes,  but  have  at  last  become  wiser,  and  it  was  even 
expected,  at  the  date  of  my  visit,  that  the  Mayor,  a  Republican,  would  succeed 
in  collecting  $700,000  of  "back  taxes."  Party  lines  are  not  especially  regarded 
in  city  politics,  there  being  a  general  happy  determination  to  take  the  best  man. 
The  negroes  have  great  numbers  of  societies,  masonic,  benevolent,  and  strictly 
religious;  and  one  often  sees  in  a  dusky  procession,  neatly  clad,  the  "Sons"  or 
"Daughters  of  Zion,"  or  the  "Independent  Pole  Bearers,"  or  the  "Sons  of 
Ham,"  or  the  "  Social  Benevolent  Society." 

Memphis  has  a  banking  capital  of  $2,000,000,  which  for  six  months  of  the 
year  is  ample,  but  during  the  cotton  season  is  by  no  means  enough.  Her 
schools  are  excellent,  both  for  white  and  black,  and  there  is  a  State  Female 
College  in  the  neighborhood.  There  are  numerous  excellent  Catholic  schools, 
to  which,  as  elsewhere  in  the  South,  those  Protestant  parents  who  do  not  yet 
look  with  favor  on  the  free  system  send  their  children.  For  about  a  year 
the  number  of  pupils  in  the  public  schools  has  been  increasing  at  the  rate 
of  two  hundred  monthly.  One -fourth  of  the  children  in  the  free  schools  are 
colored,  and  one  of  the  school-houses  for  the  blacks  contains  seven  hundred 
pupils. 

In  the  busy  season  there  are  seven  steamers  a  week  from  St.  Louis  to  Mem- 
phis, and  there  are  three  which  extend  their  trips  to  Vicksburg — a  voyage  of 
nine  hundred  miles.  The  Memphis  and  St.  Louis  Packet  Company  brings  down 
about  one  hundred  and  fifty  thousand  tons  of  freight  yearly,  and  carries  up 
stream  perhaps  forty  thousand  bales  of  cotton  in  the  same  period.  The  gigantic 
elevator  at  Memphis,  built  on  the  sloping  bluff  so  that  next  the  water  it  is  of  the 
height  of  an  ordinary  three-story  house,  showed  only  its  top  floor,  so  high  ran 
the  Mississippi,  at  the  time  of  my  visit.  From  Memphis,  steamboats  run  up  the 
Arkansas  and  the  White  rivers,  threading  their  way  to  the  interior  of  Arkansas. 
There  is  a  line  to  Napoleon,  Arkansas,  two  hundred  miles  below;  one  to  the 
plantations  on  the  St.  Francis  river,  and  one  direct  to  Cincinnati.  The  lack 
of  confidence   between   merchant  and  planter   sometimes   causes  a  diminution 


268 


THE   YELLOW   FEVER  AT   MEMPHIS. 


in  amount  of  supplies  forwarded  ;  but  the  dull  seasons  are  brief.*  The  man- 
ufactures of  Memphis  are  not  numerous;  there  are  some  oil -mills,  a  few 
foundries,  and  steam  saw -mills  for  cutting  up  the  superb  cypresses  from  the 
brakes  in  the  western  district  of  Arkansas. 

The  yellow  fever  came  to  Memphis  in  1855  and  again  in  1867,  each  time 
having  been  brought  by  steamer  from  below.  In  1867  it  was  quite  severe  in  its 
ravages,  but  was  confined  to  the  section  of  the  city  where  it  first  appeared.  In 
August  of  1873  it  came  again,  and  nothing  stayed  its  course.  Two  boats  arrived 
during  the  month  of  August,  the  "  George  C.  Wolf,"  from  Shreveport,  and  the 
tow-boat  "Bee,"  from  New  Orleans,  each  with  a  sick  man  on  board.     These  men 


The  Carnival  at  Memphis,  Tennessee — "The  gorgeous  pageants  of  the  mysterious  Memphi."     [Page  269.] 

were  put  off  at  the  upper  levee,  where  there  is  a  coal-fleet,  and  in  front  of  what  is 
known  as  "  Happy  Hollow,"  not  far  from  the  remains  of  the  Government  navy- 
yard  which  Memphis  once  boasted.  It  is  a  low,  marshy  place,  which  the  genius 
of  Dickens  would  have  delighted  to  picture,  filled  with  shanties  and  flat-boats, 
with  old  hulks  drifted  up  during  high  water  and  then  adopted  by  wretched  'long 

*  The  writer  desires  to  express  his  obligations  to  Mr.  J.  S.  Toof,  Secretary  Memphis  Cotton 
Exchange,  and  to  Messrs.  Brower  and  Thompson  of  the  Avalanche,  for  many  interesting  facts 
concerning  the  city's  growth. 


THE     MEMPHIS     CARNIVAL.  269 

shoremen  as  their  habitations.  One  of  the  two  men  died  before  he  could  be 
taken  to  hospital;  the  other  shortly  after  reaching  it,  and  the  physicians  hinted 
that  they  thought  the  disease  the  yellow  fever.  For  three  weeks  it  was  kept  in 
"Happy  Hollow,"  then  it  moved  northward  through  the  navy-yard,  and  suddenly 
several  deaths  on  Promenade  street,  one  of  the  principal  avenues,  were  announced. 

The  authorities  then  went  at  their  work,  but  it  was  too  late,  except  to  cleanse 
and  disinfect  the  city.  The  deaths  grew  daily  more  numerous ;  funerals  blocked 
the  way;  the  stampede  began.  Tens  of  thousands  of  people  fled;  other  thousands, 
not  daring  to  sleep  in  the  plague-smitten  town,  left  Memphis  nightly,  to  return  in 
the  day.  From  September  until  November  hardly  ten  thousand  people  slept  in 
town  over  night.  The  streets  were  almost  deserted  save  by  the  funeral  trains. 
Heroism  of  the  noblest  kind  was  freely  shown.  Catholic  and  Protestant  clergy- 
men and  physicians  ran  untold  risks,  and  men  and  women  freely  laid  down  their 
lives  in  charitable  service.  Twenty- five  hundred  persons  died  in  the  period 
between  August  and  November.  The  thriving  city  had  become  a  charnel  house. 
But  one  day  there  came  a  frost,  and  though  suffering  too  severely  to  be  wild  in 
their  rejoicings,  the  people  knew  that  the  plague  itself  was  doomed.  They  assem- 
bled and  adopted  an  effective  sanitary  code,  appointed  a  fine  board  of  health,  and 
cleansed  the  town.  Memphis  to-day  is  in  far  less  danger  of  a  repetition  of  the 
dreadful  scenes  of  last  year  than  are  Vicksburg  or  New  Orleans  or  half-a- 
dozen  other  Southern  cities.  Half-a-million  dollars  contributed  by  other  States 
were  expended  in  the  burial  of  the  dead  and  the  needed  medical  attendance 
during  the  reign  of  the  plague. 

This  terrible  visitation  did  not,  however,  prevent  Memphis  from  holding  her 
annual  carnival,  and  repeating,  in  the  streets  so  lately  filled  with  funerals,  the 
gorgeous  pageants  of  the  mysterious  Memphi — such  as  the  Egyptians  gazed 
on  two  thousand  years  before  Christ  was  born, — the  pretty  theatres  being 
filled  with  glitter  of  costumes  and  the  echoes  of  delicious  music.  The  carnival 
is  now  so  firmly  rooted  in  the  affections  of  the  citizens  of  Memphis  that 
nothing  can  unsettle  it 


XXVIII. 

THE  "SUPPLY"  SYSTEM  IN  THE  COTTON  COUNTRY,  AND  ITS 
RESULTS  —  NEGRO  LABOR  —  PRESENT  PLANS  OF  WORKING 
COTTON  PLANTATIONS  —  THE  BLACK  MAN  IN  THE  MISSIS- 
SIPPI     VALLEY. 

AT  Memphis  I  heard  much  concerning  the  miseries  and  revelations  of  both 
capitalists  and  laborers  in  the  cotton  country.  It  is  easy  to  see  that  the 
old  planters  are  in  trouble  under  the  new  order  of  things.  They  are  not 
willing  to  become  farmers.  "  These  people  will  never,"  said  to  me  a  gentleman 
familiar  with  the  whole  cotton-planting  interest,  "  grow  their  own  supplies  until 
they  are  compelled  to."  They  choose  to  depend  upon  the  West  for  the 
coarse  food  supplied  to  negro  laborers,  and  seem  totally  unconscious  of  the  fact 
that  they  can  never  secure  white  immigration,  so  much  desired,  until  they  raise 
the  status  of  the  laboring  man.  White  labor  has  proved  a  failure  in  a  great 
many  sections  of  the  South,  because  the  laborers  who  come  to  make  trial  are 
not  properly  met  They  are  offered  strong  inducements — can  purchase  good 
lands  on  almost  unlimited  credit,  and  are  kindly  received — but  they  find  all 
the  conditions  of  labor  so  repulsive  that  they  become  disheartened;  and  give 
up  the  experiment.  The  negro  along  the  Mississippi  works  better  than  ever 
before  since  freedom  came  to  him,  because  he  is  obliged  to  toil  or  starve,  and 
because,  being  the  main  stay  of  the  planters,  they  accord  to  him  very  favorable 
conditions.  Self-interest  is  teaching  the  planters  a  good  deal,  and  in  the 
cotton-growing  regions  of  Northern  Alabama  and  Mississippi,  as  well  as  gen- 
erally throughout  the  older  cotton  States,  a  diversity  of  crops  will  in  time  force 
itself  upon  them  as  a  measure  of  protection. 

It  is  noticed  that  cotton  culture  is  gradually  moving  from  the  Atlantic  sea- 
board to  newer  and  more  productive  lands.  The  States  west  of  the  Mississippi, 
and  bordering  on  that  stream,  are  receiving  immense  colonies  of  negroes  fleeing 
from  the  temporarily  exhausted  sections  of  Alabama,  and  the  lands  which  they 
have  left  will  soon  come  under  the  influence  of  fertilizers,  and  corn  and  rice  and 
wheat  will  be  raised.  In  consequence  of  the  gradual  change  in  the  location  of 
the  planting  interest,  buyers  from  the  North  in  such  markets  as  Memphis  hear 
from  time  to  time  that  less  cotton  is  planted  than  heretofore,  and  are  led  to  figure 
on  higher  prices;  but  they  find  that  new  lands  are  constantly  opened  up,  and  that 
the  yield  on  them  is  surprising.  It  is  the  belief  of  many  acute  observers  living  at 
important  points  along  the  Mississippi  river  that  the  ultimate  home  of  the  black 
man  is  to  be  west  of  that  stream,  on  the  rich  bottom  lands  where  the  white  man 
has  never  been  known  to  labor,  and  where  it  would  be  perilous  to  his  health 


OPINIONS      OF      COTTON      PLANTERS.  2/1 

to  settle.  In  the  fall  and  winter  of  each  year  the  migration  to  Arkansas  and 
Louisiana  is  alarming  to  the  white  planters  left  behind.  In  Western  Tennessee 
the  exodus  has  not  been  severely  felt  as  yet,  but  it  will  doubtless  come.  The 
two  hundred  thousand  negroes  in  that  rich  and  flourishing  region  are  reasonably 
content.  They  do  not,  in  the  various  counties,  enter  so  much  into  politics  as 
they  did  immediately  after  the  war.  They  show  there,  as,  indeed,  almost  every- 
where in  the  Mississippi  valley,  a  tendency  to  get  into  communities  by  them- 
selves, and  seem  to  have  no  desire  to  force  their  way  into  the  company  of  the 
white  man. 

There  must,  and  will  be,  a  radical  change  in  the  conduct  of  the  rising  gen- 
eration of  planters.  The  younger  men  are,  I  think,  convinced  that  it  is  a  mistake 
to  depend  on  Western  and  Northern  markets  for  the  articles  of  daily  consump- 
tion, and  for  nearly  everything  which  goes  to  make  life  tolerable.  But  the  elders, 
grounded  by  a  lifetime  of  habit  in  the  methods  which  served  them  well  under 
a  slave  regime,  but  which  are  ruinous  now-a-days,  will  never  change  their  course. 
They  will  continue  to  bewail  the  unfortunate  fate  to  which  they  think  themselves 
condemned — or  will  rest  in  the  assurance  that  they  can  do  very  well  in  the 
present  chaotic  condition  of  things,  provided  Providence  does  not  allow  their 
crops  to  fail.  They  cannot  be  brought  to  see  that  their  only  safety  lies  in 
making  cotton  their  surplus  crop;  that  they  must  absolutely  dig  their,  sus- 
tenance, as  well  as  their  riches,  out  of  the  ground. 

Before  the  war,  a  planter  who  owned  a  plantation  of  two  thousand  acres, 
and  two  hundred  negroes  upon  it,  would,  when  he  came  to  make  his  January 
settlement  with  his  merchant  in  town,  invest  whatever  there  was  to  his  credit 
in  more  land  and  more  negroes.  Now  the  more  land  he  buys  the  worse  he  is 
off,  because  he  finds  it  very  hard  to  get  it  worked  up  to  the  old  standard,  and 
unless  he  does,  he  can  ill  afford  to  buy  supplies  from  the  outer  world  at  the 
heavy  prices  charged  for  them — or  if  he  can  do  that,  he  can  accomplish  little 
else.  As  most  of  his  capital  was  taken  from  him  by  the  series  of  events  which 
liberated  his  slaves,  he  has  been'  compelled,  since  the  war,  to  undertake  his 
planting  operations  on  borrowed  capital,  or,  in  other  words,  has  relied  on  a 
merchant  or  middle-man  to  furnish  food  and  clothing  for  his  laborers,  and 
all  the  means  necessary  to  get  his  crop,  baled  and  weighed,  to  the  market. 
The  failure  of  his  crop  would,  of  course,  cover  him  with  liabilities ;  but  such  has 
been  his  fatal  persistence  in  this  false  system  that  he  has  been  able  to  struggle 
through,  as  in  Alabama,  three  successive  crop  failures. 

The  merchant,  somewhat  reconciled  to  the  anomalous  condition  of  affairs 
by  the  large  profits  he  can  make  on  coarse  goods  brought  long-  distances,  has 
himself  pushed  endurance  and  courage  to  an  extreme  point,  and  when  he  dare 
give  credit  no  longer,  hosts  of  planters  are  often  placed  in  the  most  painful  and 
embarrassing  positions.  So  they  gather  up  the  wrecks  of  their  fortunes,  pack 
their  Lares  and  Penates  in  an  emigrant  wagon  or  car,  and  doggedly  work  their 
way  to  Texas. 

The  appalling  failure  of  crops  in  certain  sections  has  not,  however,  lessened 
the  cotton  production  of  the  region  supplied  from  Memphis.  In  the  aggregate 
18 


272  FALLACY  OF  THE  "SUPPLY  SYSTEM." 

it  is  greater  than  ever  before,  and  I  was  informed  that  its  increase  would  be  even 
more  than  it  is  if  so  many  planters  did  not  "  overcrop  " — that  is,  plant  more 
than  they  can  cultivate.  Those  who  plant  a  little  land,  and  care  for  it  thoroughly, 
usually  make  some  money,  even  although  they  depend  upon  far-off  markets  for 
their  sustenance,  and  are  completely  at  the  mercy  of  the  merchants.  It  is 
believed  that  the  crop  failures  will  induce  planters,  in  the  sections  which  have 
suffered,  to  make  an  effort  to  grow  their  own  supplies,  and  until  that  effort  has 
been  successful,  there  can  be  no  real  prosperity  among  them.  Even  when  for- 
tune smiles,  and  they  make  a  good  crop,  but  little  is  left  after  a  settlement  with 
the  merchant.  Life  is  somewhat  barren  and  unattractive  to  the  man  who,  after 
a  laborious  season  spent  in  cultivating  one  staple,  finds  that,  after  all,  he  has  only 
made  a  living  out  of  it.  He  has  done  nothing  to  make  his  surroundings  agree- 
able and  comfortable ;  his  buildings  are  unsightly  and  rickety,  and  there  are  very 
few  stores  in  his  cellar,  if  indeed  he  has  any  cellar  at  all. 

The  region  which  finds  its  market  and  gets  its  supplies  in  Memphis,  Vicks- 
burg,  and  Natchez,  is  probably  as  fair  a  sample  of  the  cotton-producing  portion 
of  the  South  as  any  other,  and  I  found  in  it  all  the  ills  and  all  the  advantages 
complained  of  or  claimed  elsewhere.  Imagine  a  farming  country  which  depends 
absolutely  for  its  food  on  the  West  and  North-west ;  where  every  barrel  of  flour 
which  the  farmer  buys,  the  bacon  which  he  seems  to  prefer  to  the  beef  and  mut- 
ton which  he  might  raise  on  his  own  lands,  the  clothes  on  his  back,  the  shoes 
on  his  feet,  the  very  vegetables  which  the  poorest  laborer  in  the  Northern  agri- 
cultural regions  grows  in  his  door-yard — everything,  in  fact, — has  been  brought 
hundreds  of  miles  by  steamer  or  by  rail,  and  has  passed  through  the  hands  of 
the  shipper,  the  carrier,  the  wharfmen,  the  reshipper  (if  the  planter  live  in  a 
remote  section),  and  the  local  merchant ! 

Imagine  a  people  possessed  of  superior  facilities,  who  might  live,  as  the  vulgar 
saying  has  it,  on  the  fat  of  the  land,  who  are  yet  so  dependent  that  a  worm 
crawling  over  a  few  cotton  leaves,  or  the  rise  of  one  or  two  streams,  may  reduce 
them  to  misery  and  indebtedness  from  which  it  will  take  years  to  recover ! 
Men  who  consider  themselves  poorly  paid  and  badly  treated  in  Northern  farming 
and  manufacturing  regions  live  better  and  have  more  than  do  the  overseers  of 
huge  plantations  in  this  cotton  country.  If  you  enter  into  conversation  with 
people  who  fare  thus  poorly,  they  will  tell  you  that,  if  they  raise  vegetables,  the 
"  niggers  "  will  steal  them  ;  that  if  times  were  not  so  hard,  and  seasons  were  not 
so  disastrous,  the  supply  system  would  work  very  well ;  that  they  cannot  organ- 
ize their  labor  so  as  to  secure  a  basis  on  which  to  calculate  safely;  and  will 
finally  end  by  .declaring  that  the  South  is  ruined  forever. 

.  These  are  the  opinions  of  the  elders  mainly.  Younger  men,  who  see  the 
necessity  of  change  and  new  organization,  believe  that  they  must  in  future  culti- 
vate other  crops  besides  cotton ;  that  they  must  do  away  with  supply-merchants, 
and  try  at  least  to  raise  what  is  needed  for  sustenance.  There  are,  of  course,  sec- 
tions where  the  planter  finds  it  cheapest  to  obtain  his  corn  and  flour  from  St. 
Louis ;  but  these  are  small  items.  There  are  a  hundred  things  which  he  requires, 
and  which  are  grown  as  well  South  as  North.     Until  the  South  has  got  capital 


PRESENT      PLANS      OF     WORKING     PLANTATIONS.  273 

enough  together  to  localize  manufactures,  the  same  thing  must  be  said  of  all 
manufactured  articles ;  but  why  should  a  needless  expenditure  be  encouraged  by 
the  very  people  whom  it  injures  and  endangers  ? 

There  are  many  plans  of  working  large  plantations  now  in  vogue,  and  some- 
times the  various  systems  are  all  in  operation  on  the  same  tract.  The  plan  of 
"  shares  "  prevails  extensively,  the  planter  taking  out  the  expenses  of  the  crop, 
and,  when  it  is  sold,  dividing  the  net  proceeds  with  the  negroes  who  have  pro- 
duced it.  In  some  cases  in  the  vicinity  of  Natchez,  land  is  leased  to  the  freed- 
men  on  condition  that  they  shall  pay  so  many  bales  of  cotton  for  the  use  of  so 
many  acres,  furnishing  their  own  supplies.  Other  planters  lease  the  land  in  the 
same  way,  and  agree  to  furnish  the  supplies  also.  Still  others  depend  entirely 
upon  the  wages  system,  but  of  course  have  to  furnish  supplies  at  the  outset, 
deducting  the  cost  from  the  wages  paid  hands  after  the  crop  is  raised.  Sometimes 
the  plantation  is  leased  to  "  squads,"  as  they  are  called,  and  the  "  squad  leader  " 
negotiates  the  advances,  giving  "liens"  on  the  squad's  share  of  the  crop  and  on 
the  mules  and  horses  they  may  own.  This  plan  has  worked  very  well  and  is 
looked  upon  favorably. 

Under  the  slave  regime,  the  negroes  working  a  large  plantation  were  all 
quartered  at  night  in  a  kind  of  central  group  of  huts,  known  as  the  "quarters;" 
but  it  has  been  found  an  excellent  idea  to  divide  up  the  hundred  or  five  hund- 
red laborers  among  a  number  of  these  little  villages,  each  located  on  the  section 
of  the  plantation  which  they  have  leased.  By  this  process,  commonly  known  as 
"segregation  of  quarters,"  many  desirable  results  have  been  accomplished;  the 
negro  has  been  encouraged  to  devote  some  attention  to  his  home,  and  been 
hindered  from  the  vices  engendered  by  excessive  crowding.  On  some  plantations 
one  may  find  a  dozen  squads,  each  working  on  a  different  plan,  the  planters, 
or  land  owners,  hoping  in  this  way  to  find  out  which  system  will  be  most  advan- 
tageous to  themselves  and  most  binding  on  the  negro. 

Clairmont,  a  plantation  of  three  thousand  acres,  of  which  one  thousand  are 
now  cultivated,  on  the  Louisiana  side  of  the  Mississippi  river,  opposite  to  Natchez, 
is  cut  up  into  lots  of  one  hundred  acres  each,  and  on  each  division  are  ten 
laborers  who  have  leased  the  land  in  various  ways.  It  was  amusing,  by  the  way, 
to  note  the  calculation  that  one  negro  made  when  negotiating  for  one  of  these 
tracts.  He  was  to  be  allowed  one-half,  but  was  vociferous  for  one-tenth.  As  ten 
is  more  than  two,  he  supposed  a  tenth  to  be  more  than  a  half.  On  this  Clair- 
mont, in  i860,  the  owner  raised  1,000  bales  of .  cotton  and  8,000  bushels  of 
corn;  now  he  raises  about  500  bales,  and  hardly  any  corn. 

Still,  the  conduct  of  the'  laborers  is  encouraging.  The  little  villages  spring- 
ing up  here  and  there  on  the  broad  acres  have  a  tendency  to  localize  the  negroes, 
who  have  heretofore  been  very  much  inclined  to  rove  about,  and  each  man  is 
allowed  to  have  half  an  acre  of  ground  for  his  garden.  The  supplies  spoken 
of  as  furnished  the  negroes  are  of  the  rudest  description — pork,  meal  and 
molasses — all  brought  hundreds,  nay,  thousands  of  miles,  when  every  one  of 
the  laborers  could,  with  a  little  care,  grow  enough  to  feed  himself  and  his 
family. 


274  NEGRO   LABORERS THE   HEBREW   IN   TRADE. 

But  the  negro  throughout  the  cotton  belt  takes  little  thought  for  the  mor- 
row. He  works  lazily,  although,  in  some  places,  pretty  steadily.  In  others  he 
takes  a  day  here  and  there  out  of  the  week  in  such  a  manner  as  to  render  him 
almost  useless.  The  planter  always  feels  that  the  negro  is  irresponsible  and 
must  be  taken  care  of.  If  he  settles  on  a  small  tract  of  land  of  his  own,  as  so 
many  thousand  do  now-a-days,  he  becomes  almost  a  cumberer  of  the  ground, 
caring  for  nothing  save  to  get  a  living,  and  raising  only  a  bale  of  cotton  or  so 
wherewith  to  get  "supplies."  For  the  rest  he  can  fish  and  hunt.  He  does  n't 
care  to  become  a  scientific  farmer.  Thrift  has  no  charms  for  him.  He  has  never 
been  educated  to  care  for  himself;  how  should  he  suddenly  leap  forth,  a  new 
man,  into  the  changed  order  of  things  ? 

Nevertheless,  some  of  the  planters  along  the  river  near  Natchez  said,  "  Give 
the  negro  his  due.  The  merchant  will  ordinarily  stand  a  better  chance  of  collect- 
ing all  his  advance  from  fifty  small  black  planters  than  from  fifty  whites  of  the 
same  class,  when  the  crop  is  successful."  But  if  the  negro's  crop  fails,  he  feels 
very  loth  to  pay  up,  although  he  may  have  the  means.  He  seems  to  think 
the  debt  has  become  outlawed.  In  success  he  is  generally  certain  to  pay  his 
"store  account,"  which  is  varied,  and  comprehends  a  history  of  his  progress 
during  the  year. 

The  shrewd  Hebrew,  who  has  entered  into  the  commerce  of  the  South  in 
such  a  manner  as  almost  to  preclude  Gentile  competition,  understands  the 
freedman  very  well,  and  manages  him  in  trade.  The  negro  likes  to  be  treated 
with  consideration  when  he  visits  the  "  store,"  and  he  finds  something  refreshing % 
and  friendly  in  the  profuse  European  manner  and  enthusiastic  lingo  of  Messrs. 
Moses  and  Abraham.  The  Hebrew  merchants  have  large  establishments  in  all 
the  planting  districts.  In  Mississippi  and  in  some  other  sections  they  have  made 
more  than  ioo  per  cent,  retail  profit,  and  excuse  themselves  for  it  by  saying 
that  as  they  do  not  always  get  their  money,  they  must  make  up  for  bad  debts. 
They  are  obliged  to  watch  both  white  and  black  planters  who  procure  advances 
from  them,  to  make  sure  that  they  produce  a  crop.  If  the  merchant  sees  that 
there  is  likely  to  be  but  half  a  crop,  he  sometimes  notifies  the  planters  that  they 
must  thereafter  draw  only  half  the  amount  agreed  upon  at  the  outset.  In  short, 
in  some  sections  the  Hebrew  is  the  taskmaster,  arbiter  and  guardian  of  the 
planters'  destinies. 

Some  of  the  elder  planters  are  liberal  in  their  ideas,  and  would  welcome  a 
complete  change  in  the  labor  system,  but  they  do  not  believe  one  possible.  One 
of  the  best  known  and  influential  in  the  valley  told  me  that  he  and  his  neigh- 
bors in  the  magnificent  Yazoo  country,  where  the  superb  fertility  of  the  soil  gives 
encouragement  even  to  the  rudest  labors,  had  tried  every  expedient  to  bring  new 
labor  into  their  section,  but  could  not  succeed.  His  laborers  were  now  practically 
his  tenants;  but  he  had  to  supply  them  and  to  watch  over  them,  very  much  as  he 
did  before  the  war.  He  was  willing  to  admit  that  the  negro  was  better  adapted 
to  the  work  than  any  white  man  who  might  come  there  ;  but  thought  the  younger 
generation  of  negroes  was  growing  up  idle  and  shiftless,  fond  of  whiskey  and 
carousing,  and  that  the  race  was  diminishing  in  fibre  and  strength.     Those  who 


LOUISIANA      COTTON      PLANTATIONS      SINCE      THE      WAR.  275 

had  been  slaves  were  industrious,  and  conducted  themselves  as  well  as  they  knew 
how ;  but  the  others,  both  men  and  women,  seemed  to  think  that  liberty 
meant  license,  and  acted  accordingly.  They  were  wasteful,  and  there  was 
but  little  chance  of  making  them  a  frugal  and  foresighted  farming  people. 
Whenever  they  could  secure  a  little  money  the  ground  in  front  of  their  cabins 
would  be  strewn  with  sardine  boxes  and  whiskey  bottles. 

The  planters  in  the  lowlands  of  Arkansas,  Mississippi,  and  Louisiana  have 
been  particularly  troubled  to  get  and  keep  serviceable  plantation  labor ;  and  are 
now  importing  large  numbers  from  Alabama.  In  truth,  the  hundreds  who  flock 
in  from  the  older  cotton  States  were  starving  at  home.  On  a  plantation  in  Con- 
cordia parish,  in  Louisiana,  opposite  Natchez,  there  are  many  of  these  Alabama 
negroes.  One  planter  went  into  the  interior  of  that  State,  and  engaged  a 
hundred  and  twenty-five  to  follow  him.  They  did  not  succeed  in  leaving 
without  meeting  with  remonstrances  from  the  colored  politicians,  but  were  glad 
to  flee  from  an  empty  cupboard. 

Densely  ignorant  as  these  negroes  are,  they  are  yet  capable  of  fine  develop- 
ment. They  have  sound  sense,  and  some  idea  of  manners,  seem  well-inclined 
toward  their  employers,  and  appear  to  appreciate  their  own  defects.  On  many 
of  these  plantations  on  the  lowlands  the  negroes  do  not  vote ;  on  some  they  are 
even  hired  with  the  distinct  understanding  that  they  shall  not,  unless  they  wish 
to  be  discharged.  But  sooner  or  later  the  politicians  reach  them,  and  they 
become  political  victims. 

I  took  a  ride  one  morning  in  this  same  Concordia  parish  for  the  purpose  of 
conversing  with  the  planters,  and  getting  testimony  as  to  the  actual  condition 
of  the  laborers.  Concordia  was  once  the  garden  spot  of  Louisiana  ;  its  aspect 
was  European  ;  the  fine  roads  were  bordered  with  delicious  hedges  of  Cherokee 
rose ;  grand  trees,  moss-hung  and  fantastic  in  foliage,  grew  along  the  green  banks 
of  a  lovely  lake ;  every  few  miles  a  picturesque  grouping  of  coarsely  thatched 
roofs  marked  negro  "quarters,"  and  near  by  gleamed  the  roof  of  some  planter's 
mansion.  In  this  parish  there  was  no  law  and  but  little  order — save  such  as  the 
inhabitants  chose  to  maintain.  The  negroes  whom  I  met  on  the  road  were 
nearly  all  armed,  most  of  them  carrying  a  rifle  over  their  shoulders,  or  balanced 
on  the  backs  of  the  mules  they  were  riding.  Affrays  among  the  negroes  are 
very  common  throughout  that  region ;  but,  unless  the  provocation  has  been 
very  great,  they  rarely  kill  a  white  man. 

In  a  trip  of  perhaps  ten  miles  I  passed  through  several  once  prosperous 
plantations,  and  made  special  inquiries  as  to  their  present  condition.  Upon  one 
where  six  hundred  bales  of  cotton  were  annually  produced  under  slave  culture, 
the  average  annual  yield  is  now  but  two  hundred  and  fifty ;  on  another  the 
yearly  average  had  fallen  from  one  thousand  to  three  hundred  bales;  and  on  two 
others  which  together  gave  the  market  fifteen  hundred  bales  every  year,  now 
barely  six  hundred  are  raised.  The  planters  in  this  section  thought  that  cotton 
production  had  fallen  off  fully  two-thirds.  The  number  of  negroes  at  work  on 
each  of  these  plantations  was  generally  much  less  than  before  the  war.  Then  a 
bale  to  the  acre  was  realized,  now  about  one  bale  to  three  acres  is  the  average. 


276     WAGES     PAID     NEGROES  —  DIVERSIFIED     FARM     CULTURE      NEEDED 

Much -of  this  land  is  "leased"  to  the  negro  at  the  rate  of  a  bale  of  cotton  weigh- 
ing four  hundred  and  thirty  pounds  for  each  six  acres. 

The  planters  there  raise  a  little  corn,  but  are  mainly  supplied  from  the  West. 
The  inundation  was  upon  them  at  the  epoch  of  my  visit,  and  they  were  in 
momentary  expectation  of  seeing  all  their  year's  hopes  destroyed.  The  infamous 
robberies,  also,  to  which  they  had  been  subjected  by  the  Legislature,  and  the 
overwhelming  taxation,  had  left  them  bitterly  discouraged.  One  plantation 
which  I  visited,  -having  sixteen  hundred  acres  of  cleared  land  in  it,  and  standing 
in  one  of  the  most  fertile  sections  of  the  State,  was  originally  valued  at  one 
hundred  dollars  per  acre ;  now  it  could  not  be  sold  for  ten  dollars.  In  Madison 
parish  recently  a  plantation  of  six  hundred  improved  acres,  which  originally 
cost  thirty  thousand  dollars,  was  offered  to  a  neighboring  planter  for  seven 
hundred  dollars. 

The  "  wages "  accorded  the  negro,  when  he  works  on  the  wages  system, 
amount  to  fifteen  or  sixteen  dollars  monthly.  But  few  ever  save  any  money;  and 
this  remark  will,  I  think,  apply  to  the  majority  of  the  .negroes  engaged  in  agricul- 
ture throughout  the  cotton  region  of  the  Mississippi  valley.  Still  there  are 
praiseworthy  exceptions  to  this  general  rule.  Enormous  prices  are  placed  upon 
everything,  because  of  the  cost  of  transportation.  The  grangers  have  accom- 
plished some  good  in  the  cotton  States  by  buying  for  cash  and  selling  for  cash, 
the  object  being  to  keep  supplies  as  near  the  wholesale  price  as  possible,  and 
have  already  become  a  formidable  organization  there,  having  scores  of  societies, 
small  and  large,  in  Alabama,  Georgia,  Tennessee,  and  Mississippi. 

While  there  is  no  doubt  that  an  active,  moneyed,  and  earnest  immigration 
would  do  much  toward  building  up  the  southern  portion  of  the  Mississippi  valley, 
it  is  evident  that  so  long  as  the  negro  remains  in  his  present  ignorance,  and  both 
he  and  the  planter  rely  on  other  States  for  their  sustenance,  and  on  Providence 
never  to  send  them  rainy  days,  inundations,  or  caterpillars,  the  development  of 
the  section  will  be  subject  to  too  serious  drawbacks  to  allow  of  any  considerable 
progress.  All  the  expedients,  the  tenant  systems,  and  years  of  accidental  success 
will  not  take  the  place  of  thorough  and  diversified  culture,  and  intelligent,  con- 
tented labor  resulting  from  fair  wages  for  fair  work.  Nothing  but  the  education 
of  the  negro  up  to  the  point  of  ambition,  foresight,  and  a  desire  to  acquire  a 
competence  lawfully  and  laboriously,  will  ever  thoroughly  develop  the  Lower 
Mississippi  valley.  As  the  negro  is  certainly  to  inhabit  it  for  many  years  at 
least,  if  not  forever,  how  shall  he  learn  the  much-needed  lesson  ? 

On  the  other  hand,  the  whites  need  to  be  converted  to  a  sense  of  the  dignity 
of  labor,  to  learn  to  treat  the  laboring  man  with  proper  consideration,  to  create 
in  him  an  intelligent  ambition  by  giving  him  education.  Something  besides  an 
introduction  to  political  liberties  and  responsibilities  is  needed  to  make  the 
negro  a  moral  and  worthy  citizen.  He  is  struggling  slowly  and  not  very  surely 
out  of  a  lax  and  barbarously  immoral  condition.  The  weight  of  nearly  two 
centuries  of  slavery  is  upon  his  back.  He  needs  more  help  and  counsel.  An 
old  master  will  tell  you  that  he  can  discover  who  of  his  employe's  has  been  a 
slave,  "for  the  slave,"  he  says,  "cannot  look  you  in  the  eye  without  flinching." 


THE      FREEDMAN'S     DILEMMA. 


277 


Neither  can  the  ex- slave  be  very  moral,  if  indeed  moral  at  all.  It  is  hard  for 
him  to  bear  the  yoke  of  the  family  relation.  Although  conscious  that  he  is  a 
freeman,  and  can  leave  his  employer  in  the  lurch  if  he  chooses,  he  is,  here  and 
there,  almost  content  to  slip  back  into  the  old  devil-may-care  dependence  of 
slavery.  The  responsibilities  of  freedom  are  almost  too  much  for  him.  He  has 
entered  upon  a  battle-field  armed  with  poor  and  cumbersome  weapons,  weighed 
down  with  ignorance  and  "previous  condition  ;"  and  I  venture  to  say  that  no  one 
feels  the  difficulty  and  bitterness  of  his  position  more  keenly  than  he  does  himself. 

Unable  as  he  is  to  aid  in  his  own  upbuilding,  it  is  to  be  considered  whether 
there  is  not  really  more  room  now  for  educational  enterprises,  and  for  a  general 
diffusion  of  intelligence  among  his  race,  by  Northern  and  Western  men  and 
women,  than  there  was  immediately  after  the  war.  Might  it  not  be  wise  to 
appoint  commissioners  to  investigate  thoroughly  the  labor  question  in  the 
South,  and  to  make  a  final  effort  to  remedy  its  evils  by  every  proper  means  ? 
Events  have  shown  that  the  National  Government  must  undertake  the  improve- 
ment and  the  control  of  the  Mississippi  river  ;  why  ought  it  not  to  devote  some 
little  attention  to  the  removal  of  the  obstacles  to  immigration  into  the  most 
fertile  sections  of  the  Mississippi  valley  ? 


"-■"-.,..       ".-■■■':■! 


A  Steamboat  Torch- Basket 


XXIX. 

ARKANSAS — ITS    RESOURCES — ITS     PEOPLE  —  ITS    POLITICS. 
TAXATION — THE    HOT     SPRINGS. 

NEARLY  two  hundred  miles  below  Memphis,  at  the  mouth  of  the  Arkansas 
river,  and  on  lowlands  which,  when  I  saw  them,  were  drowned  and 
buried  under  the  combined  flood  of  the  two  great  rivers,  stands  Napoleon, 
once  a  flourishing  town,  but  now  gradually  slipping  away  into  the  stream. 
The  only  other  towns  on  the  Arkansas  bank  of  the  river,  of  importance,  are 
Sterling,  which  lies  at  the  mouth  of  the  St.  Francis  river,  and  Helena,  a  rather 
thriving  and  vigorous  community  of  five  thousand  inhabitants.  The  White 
river,  which  was  the  scene  of  much  fighting  during  the  war,  comes  down 
from  the  wilds  a  little  above  Napoleon,  and  pours  its  floods  into  the  Arkan- 
sas. Napoleon  did  not  have  a  good  reputation  in  past  days.  Various  anec- 
dotes, not  entirely  devoid  of  grim  humor,  were  told  of  it,  as  illustrating  the 
manners  of  the  town.  It  was  at  Napoleon  that  the  man  showed  a  casual 
passer-by  on  a  steamboat  a  pocket  full  of  ears,  and,  with  a  grin,  announced 
that  he  was  among  the  boys  while  they  were  having  a  frolic  last  night. 
Murder,  daily,  was  the  rule,  and  not  the  exception.  Brawls  always  ended  in 
burials.  Even  now-a-days  there  are  occasional  scenes,  which  end  in  furious 
free  fights.  A  pilot  on  one  of  the  up-river  steamers  one  day  went  into  a 
saloon  where  a  group  were  playing  cards.  The  bystanders  laughed  at  the 
loser,  and  the  pilot  laughed  to©.  Being  a  stranger,  his  laughter  was  resented 
by  the  loser,  who  pulled  a  bowie-knife  from  his  boot,  and  made  a  desperate 
lunge  at  him.  The  pilot  returned  to  his  boat.  But  the  river  is  yearly  more 
and  more  closely  embracing  the  doomed  town,  and  the  roughs,  like  the  rats, 
will  leave  before  the  final  engulfing  comes.  In  war  time,  Napoleon  was  an 
important  rendezvous  for  gunboats  and  other  warlike  craft ;  the  United  States 
Marine  Hospital  there  had  been  seized  by  the  Confederates  when  Arkansas 
seceded,  but  was  recovered  as  soon  as  the  Mississippi  was  partially  opened. 

These  wild  and  weird  forests  and  swamps  bordering  the  junction  of  the 
Arkansas  and  Mississippi  were  threaded  by  the  French  as  early  as  167 1,  and 
the  State  now  known  as  Arkansas  was  a  part  of  Louisiana  until  the  purchase 
made  by  the  United  States  in  18 12.  It  had  a  varying  fortune  for  some  time 
thereafter;  was  made  a  territory  in  18 19,  then  became  part  of  Missouri  terri- 
tory, but  was  finally  admitted  into  the  Union  as  a  separate  State  in  1836. 
Arkansas  is  in  area  one -sixth  larger  than  the  State  of  New  York,  comprising 
more  than  fifty-two  thousand  square  miles.  It  is  separated  by  Nature  into 
two  important  divisions — the  one  comprehending  some  of  the  richest  agricul- 


THE      STATE      OF      ARKANSAS ITS      RIVERS. 


279 


tural  bottom  lands  in  the  world,  the  other  containing  vast  deposits  of  valuable 
minerals.  The  mountain  ranges,  beginning  in  the  south-western  part  of  the 
State,  develop  into  the  Masserne  range,  and  toward  the  north  and  east  become 
broad,  elevated  tracts  until  they  reach  the  Ozark  mountains,  which  run  from 
the  vicinity  of  Little  Rock,  north  and  west,  into  Missouri.  The  often- repeated 
remark  that  "Arkansas  is  all  swamp  and  backwoods"  is  an  error  inexcusable  in 
one  who  travels  so  much  as  does  the  average  American.  There  are  tracts  along 
the  Mississippi  which  certainly  are  swamps,  and  will  remain  such  until  reclaimed 
by  some  general  system  of  drainage ;  but  they  comprehend  but  a  small  portion 


View  on  the  Arkansas  River  at  Little  Rock. 


even  of  the  lowlands.  Drainage  is  necessary  both  to  render  the  land  productive, 
and  to  guard  against  the  spread  of  pernicious  climatic  diseases.*  The  lands 
which  extend  from  Napoleon  to  Memphis  on  the  Arkansas  side  form  the  nucleus 
of  a  mighty  lowland  empire.  Drained,  settled,  and  carefully  cultured,  they 
would  produce  almost  incalculable  wealth.  The  negro  is  the  man  for  this  work. 
He  is  adapted  to  the  climate,  and  if  he  had  but  the  ambition,  could  speedily 
enrich  himself. 

The  Arkansas  river  journeys  two  thousand  miles  to  meet  the  Mississippi 
coming  eastward  from  the  mountains  of  Colorado ;  and  the  entrance  from  it  into 
the  White  river,  near  its  mouth,  is  easy.  The  White  river  drains,  with  its  tribu- 
taries, a  large  expanse  in  the  north-western,  middle,  and  south-eastern  parts  of 
the  State,  and  renders  the  transportation  of  products  easy  and  inexpensive.  The 
Arkansas  forms  a  superb  water-way  directly  across  the  State,  and  into  the 
recesses  of  the  Indian  Territory.  It  is  navigable  for  several  months  in  the  year, 
and  with  needed  improvements  might  be  always  serviceable.  The  Ouachita  and 
its  contributing  streams  drain  that  part  of  the  State  lying  south  of  the  Arkansas 
river,  and  the  Red  river  gives  drainage  to  the  south-west.  It  would  be  difficult 
to  find  another  State  of  which  it  can  be  said  that  of  its  seventy- three  counties 
fifty- one  are  watered  by  navigable  streams.  The  climate  varies  with  the  location, 
but  none  could  be  healthier  than  that  of  the  romantic  mountain  region  ;  more 
invigorating  than  that  of  the  thick  pine  forests  in  the  lower  counties ;  or  more 
malarial  than  are  the  undrained  and  uncleared  bottom  lands. 
*   "Resources  of  Arkansas,"  by  James  P.  Henry. 


2SO       THE     ST.      LOUIS,      SOUTHERN     AND     IRON     MOUNTAIN     RAILROAD. 

Time  was  when  a  journey  up  the  Arkansas  river  was  not  devoid  of  thrilling 
adventure ;  when  the  passengers  stopping  at  Little  Rock  laid  their  bowie-knives 
and  pistols  beside  their  knives  and  forks,  on  the  hotel  table,  at  supper  ;  and  when 
along  the  river-bank  could  be  heard  the  pistol-shot  from  time  to  time.  Great 
numbers  of  outlaws  from  the  older  States  came  to  Arkansas  when  it  was  first 
opened  up,  and,  fascinated  with  the  grandeur  and  beauty  of  the  more  elevated 
portions  of  the  State,  they  remained  there, — some  to  become  honest  and  hard- 
working citizens,  others  to  pursue  their  old  callings  of  robbery  and  murder,  and 
finally  to  die  at  the  muzzle  of  a  rifle.  Wild  life  and  careless  culture  of  the  soil, 
disregard  of  humanizing  influences,  and  a  general  spirit  of  indifference,  character- 
ized large  numbers  of  the  people ;  while  others  were  as  orderly,  enterprising  and 
industrious  as  those  to  be  found  in  any  of  the  older  States.  But  the  common- 
wealth has  thus  far  been  completely  terra  Hncognita  to  the  people  of  the  North 
and  East.  No  railroads,  up  to  a  very  recent  date,  have  penetrated  its  fertile 
lands  ;  river  navigation  has  been  tedious  and  unattractive  ;  and  the  stories,  more 
or  less  exaggerated,  told  of  the  sanguinary  propensities  of  some  classes  of  the 
inhabitants,  were  such  a  grotesque  mixture  of  fun  and  horror,  that  civilized  peo- 
ple had  no  more  desire  to  go  there  than  to  Central  Africa. 

But  now  the  most  effective  civilizer,  the  iron  rail,  has  been  laid  across 
the  State.  The  St.  Louis,  Southern,  and  Iron  Mountain  railroad  has  stretched  an 
arm  from  the  Missouri  border  down  the  Black  and  White  River  valleys  to  Little 
Rock,  the  pretty  and  flourishing  capital  of  the  commonwealth  ;  thence  through 
Arkadelphia,  along  the  Ouachita  valley,  and  across  the  Little  Missouri  and  the 
Red  River  valley  to  the  Texas  boundary,  where  it  connects  with  the  Inter- 
national and  Great  Northern  and  the  Trans- Continental.  In  other  words,  it  has 
placed  Arkansas  on  the  direct  high  road  to  Texas,  and  opened  up  to  settlement, 
on  terms  which  the  poorest  immigrant  can  accept,  good  lands  for  raising  corn  and 
the  smaller  grains;  uplands  wooded  with  pine,  and  bottoms  all  through  the  Red 
River  valley  timbered  with  walnut,  oak  and  ash,  noble  cotton  lands,  and  a  fine 
country  for  fruit  and  grapes.  The  wild  grape  grows  abundantly  in  the  forests, 
and  to  large  size.  Along  the  line  of  this  railroad  also  are  scattered  iron,  coal, 
kaolin,  and  clay  in  large  deposits.  That  portion  of  the  road  extending  from  the 
Missouri  border  down  was  built  as  the  Cairo  and  Fulton  railroad,  giving  a 
through  line  from  Cairo,  on  the  Mississippi,  to  Fulton,  on  the  Texas  line  ;  but  it 
is  now  consolidated  with  the  St.  Louis  and  Iron  Mountain  road,  which  has 
recently  completed  its  line  from  St.  Louis  to  Little  Rock,  running  through  the 
range  of  mineral  mountains  in  South-eastern  Missouri,  and  uniting  with  the 
Cairo  and  Fulton  route  at  Newport.  In  the  White  River  valley  there  are 
some  of  the  loveliest  river  bottom  lands  on  the  continent,  where  cotton  yields  a 
bale  or  a  bale  and  a-half,  corn  seventy-five  bushels,  and  wheat  twenty-five 
bushels  to  the  acre.  This  section' of  Arkansas  is  also  admirably  suited  for  the 
culture  of  tobacco  and  hemp,  besides  being  an  excellent  fruit  and  stock  country. 
Along  this  mammoth  line  of  rail,  nearly  two  million  of  acres,  confirmed  to  the 
company  by  act  of  Congress,  are  now  in  market,  and  immigrants  are  rapidly 
settling  at  distances  of  five  and  ten  miles  from  the  railroad. 


LITTLE      ROCK,      THE      ARKANSAS      CAPITAL. 


28l 


The  Arkansas  river  at  Little  Rock  is  broad  and  noble,  and  here  and  there 
the  bluffs  are  imposing.  The  town  is  said  to  take  its  name  from  a  small  rock 
on  the  west  side  of  the  stream, — the  first  one  encountered  on  that  side  from  the 
mouth  of  the  Mississippi  to  that  point, — so  level  is  the  alluvial.  Some  distance 
up  stream,  on  the  east  bank  of  the  Arkansas,  stands  Big  Rock,  a  bluff  of  a  little 
prominence.  The  river  is  handsomely  bridged  for  the  railroad's  convenience,  and 
Little  Rock,  since  the  iron  horse  first  snorted  in  its  streets,  has  had  a  wonderful 
growth.  It  is  a  handsome,  well  laid  out  town,  containing  20,000  inhabitants ; 
and  one  can  see,  from  any  eminence,  hundreds  of  small,  neat  houses — the  best 
testimonials  to  individual  thrift  in  a  community.  The  handsome  but  somewhat 
dilapidated  State  Capitol,  the  picturesque  Penitentiary,  perched  on  a  rocky  hill, 
the  Deaf  and  Dumb  State  Asylum,  the  Asylum  for  the  Blind,  the  land  offices  of 


The  Arkansas  State  Capitol  —  Little  Rock. 
I 

the  railroad  companies,  St.  John's  College,  and  St.  Mary's  Academy,  are  among 
its  best  public  buildings.  Many  of  its  streets  are  beautifully  shaded,  and  the 
peach-trees  were  in  bloom  on  the  March  days  when  I  visited  it.  The  main  part 
of  the  city  lies  on  a  high,  rolling  plateau  overlooking  the  river ;  back  at  some 
distance  from  the  stream  is  the  arsenal  and  post  where  United  States  troops  are 
still  stationed,  and  near  by  is  a  national  cemetery.  Little  Rock  was  for  many 
'years  the  home  of  General  Albert  Pike,  the  noted  Confederate  general  and  poet, 
and  his  mansion  is  pointed  out  with  pride  by  the  people  of  the  State.  There, 
too,  lived  for  many  years  the  original  of  the  "Arkansas  Traveler,"  whose  story 
has  penetrated  to  the  uttermost  ends  of  the  earth ;  and  there  the  negro  has  done 
much  to  increase  one's  faith  in  his  capacity  for  industry  and  progress. 

The  colored  citizens  of  Little  Rock  and  of  Arkansas  in  general,  number  many 
gentlemen  of  education  and  refinement.     The  Superintendent  of  the  Penitentiary, 


282  COLORED      CITIZENS THE      STATE      DEBT. 

the  Commissioner  of  State  Lands,  the  Superintendent  of  Public  Instruction,  some 
of  the  State  senators,  police  judges,  and  many  preachers  of  excellent  ability,  are 
colored  men.  Among  these  gentlemen  are  graduates  of  Harvard  University  and 
of  Oberlin,  and  of  many  of  the  best  Western  schools.  A  large  proportion  of  the 
colored  people  at  Little  Rock  own  their  own  homes,  which  are  mainly  in  the 
third  ward,  whence  two  aldermen, — black  men  and  slaves  up  to  the  war,  but 
now  worth  from  $5,000  to  $10,000  each, — are  sent  up  to  the  Council.  At 
Helena  and  Little  Rock  there  have  been  many  noteworthy  instances  of  progress 
among  the  negroes.  This  is  not  so  common  in  the  back-country,  although  some 
of  the  counties  have  colored  sheriffs  and  clerks.  One  of  the  most  intelligent  of 
his  race  in  the  State  told  me  that  the  negroes  had,  as  a  rule,  a  horror  of  clearing 
up  new  land,  and  that  they  had  been  a  good  deal  hindered  from  undertaking 
cotton-farming  by  the  lack  of  means  to  begin  with, — this  requiring  quite  an 
outlay.  The  large  landholders,  too,  have  generally  been  averse  to  selling  land  in 
small  parcels.  For  these  reasons  the  country  negroes  are  mainly  "  hired  labor- 
ers, working  on  shares,  or  tenants  by  rental,  payable  in  produce."  In  either 
case  the  landlord  often  furnishes  the  supplies  of  food,  seed  and  stock,  and  at  the 
annual  settlement  has  the  lion's  share  of  the  proceeds,  the  laborers  making  little 
more  than  their  living  for  the  year.  A  very  reliable  colored  man  told  me  that  if 
the  freedmen  of  Arkansas  had  made  less  progress  since  the  war  than  those  of  the 
elder  States  since  emancipation,  he  believed  it  to  be  because  the  white  population 
of  Arkansas  was  also,  in  many  respects,  behind  that  of  the  other  States,  being 
more  sparsely  settled  and  isolated,  without  large  towns,  railroads,  and  other 
improving  agencies.  The  educational  societies  of  the  North  had  comparatively 
neglected  the  State.  Political  commotions  had  been  the  rule  ever  since  recon- 
struction, and  the  State  was  already  bankrupt  at  the  outbreak  of  the  war.  The 
Republican  party,  which  came  in  with  reconstruction,  inaugurated  vast  schemes 
for  "  internal  improvements,"  and  to  obtain  means  to  carry  on  said  improve- 
ments, funded  the  old  ante-bellum  bonds  of  the  State  as  a  pledge  of  good  faith. 
This  process,  he  thought,  had  resulted  in  a  large  increase  of  the  State  debt,  the 
debt  in  onerous  taxation,  and  the  taxation  in  a  high  rental.  The  State  bonds 
outstanding  March  14,  1874,  are  classified  as  follows: 

Railroad*  aid  bonds $5,350,000 

Funded  bond,   July  1,    1869 2,000,000 

Funded  bond,  January   1,    1870 2,350,000 

Levee  bonds 2,208,500 

Outstanding  insurance  certificates 1,600,000 

Some  manufacturing  has  been  introduced  at  Little  Rock,  and  the  wholesale 
trade  of  the  town  is  very  large,  although  as  no  organized  chamber  of  commerce 
yet  exists,  I  could  riot  discover  its  amount.  At  the  close  of  the  war  it  was  only 
a  small  village,  with  little  or  no  railroad  outlet,  and  with  a  minor  trade.  Planters 
had  been  in  the  habit  of  bringing  almost  literally  everything  which  they  needed 
from  Memphis ;  the  idea  of  keeping  supplies  in  the  State  had  never  occurred  to 
them.     Now  the  through  route  to  Texas,  the  Memphis  and  Little  Rock,  and  the 


THE      CHARACTER     OF     THE     ARKANSAS     PEOPLE.  283 

Little  Rock  and  Fort  Smith  railroads  give  plenty  of  outlets,  and  are  bringing  the 
town  considerable  new  population.  The  latter  route,  in  which  a  good  many 
Eastern  men  are  interested,  is  not  yet  completed,  and  is  in  wretched  financial 
and  material  condition,  but  it  runs  through  a  fine  country,  and,  if  ever  finished, 
will  develop  the  most  interesting  portion  of  Arkansas.  The  noble  country  along 
the  borders  of  the  Indian  Territory  needs  developing :  it  is  rich  in  minerals  and 
in  grand  mountain  scenery,  but  is  now  in  semi-barbaric  hands,  and  it  will  take  a 
persistent  effort  to  improve  the  tone  of  society  there.  Fort  Smith  is  on  the 
Arkansas  river  and  the  border  of  the  Territory,  has  a  population  of  3,000,  is  a 
military  post  whence  offenders  from  the  Indian  Territory  are  taken  to  be  tried, 
and  once  had  a  very  extensive  Western  trade,  which  has  been  taken  away  by 
the  passage  of  the  Missouri,  Kansas  and  Texas  line  of  rail  within  sixty-five 
miles  of  the  town.  Society  throughout  this  section  is  said  to  be  improving. 
My  own  opinion  is  that  it  will  never  improve  much  in  the  face  of  ignorance, 
whiskey,  and  weapons.  Most  of  the  deadly  broils  occur  between  drunken 
ruffians,  whose  only  sentiment  is  revenge  by  pistol-shot,  and  whose  chief  amuse- 
ment is  coarse  and  bestial  intoxication.  The  "  Fort  Smith  road  "  runs  through 
the  counties  of  Pulaski,  Vincennes,  Faulkner,  Conway,  Pope,  Johnson,  Franklin, 
Crawford,  and  Sebastian.  Conway,  Lewisburgh,  and  Russelville  promise  to  be 
important  towns  along  the  line,  although  the  local  business  is  thus  far  slight. 

Over  the  33,000,000  of  acres  in  Arkansas  are  scattered  barely  500,000  people, 
and  the  nature  of  their  employment  forbids  the  building  of  many  large  towns. 
The  grade  of  intelligence  in  the  interior  districts,  where  they  have  never  had 
schools,  is  much  the  same  as  in  Eastern  Tennessee.  There  are  fewer  churches 
than  school-houses  in  the  "up-country.".  The  masses  of  the  whites  are  ambi- 
tionless ;  and  even  the  most  enthusiastic  that  I  met  seemed  dubious  about  the 
State's  prospects.  The  north-eastern  current  of  immigration  is  wanted,  and 
would  do  much  toward  reforming  the  State.  Something  beyond  a  rough  pros- 
perity in  cotton-raising  and  whiskey  seems  to  be  demanded ;  and  the  cultured 
people  living  in  the  larger  towns  are  making  special  efforts  to  redeem  the  com- 
monwealth from  the  bad  name  it  has  received.  Certainly  Little  Rock's  hand- 
some development  should  do  much  to  make  one  believe  in  the  State's  possibili- 
ties ;  it  has  a  flourishing  library,  a  dozen  good  churches,  several  well-ordered 
banks,  and  fine  streets ;  society  and  schools  are  as  good  as  in  Eastern  towns  of 
the  same  size.  But  in  the  back-country  ! — there  the  prospect  is  very  different. 
Little  Rock,  with  its  streets  and  gardens  filled  with  azaleas,  japonicas,  China  and 
peach-trees,  the  queenly  magnolia,  and  the  lovely  box-elders  and  elms,  is  "a 
striking  contrast  to  some  of  the  rude  lowland  towns  near  the  river,  or  the  log- 
built,  unkempt  settlements  in  the  interior,  where  morals  are  bad,  manners  worse, 
and  there  are  no  comforts  or  graces.  The  Presbyterian  Church  South  is  the 
prevailing  denomination  at  Little  Rock,  and  Northern  people  worship  in  it, 
politics  being  eschewed.  The  schools  are,  of  course,  classified  for  black  and 
white ;  mixed  schools  having  been  nowhere  attempted,  or,  indeed,  demanded. 
The  Industrial  University  at  Fayetteville  is  to  be  a  powerful  institution,  and  the 
Judsonian  University,  located  at  Judsonia,  in  White  county,  is  one  of  the  hopes 


284  SCHOOLS VEXATIONS      IN      POLITICS. 

of  the  future.  Schools  have  been  organized  and  maintained  for  a  number  of 
years  in  Fort  Smith,  Pine  Bluffs,  Helena,  Arkadelphia,  Dardanelle  and  Camden, 
and  have  been  well  attended  by  both  white  and  black  children.  The  State 
Superintendent  could  not  inform  me  how  many  schools  were  in  operation  in  the 
community ;  inasmuch  as  he  had  to  operate  with  only  the  semi-annual  appor- 
tionment of  $55,000  in  State  scrip,  worth  forty  cents  on  the  dollar,  he  could  not 
make  much  new  effort.  He  admitted  that  but  little  progress  in  education  had  as 
yet  been  made  in  the  remote  parts  of  Arkansas ;  the  thinly  settled  character  of 
the  region  preventing  neighborhood  schools. 

The  vexed  condition  of  politics  in  the  State  since  the  war  has  greatly  hin- 
dered its  development.  People  complained  a  good  deal  of  the  manner  in  which 
the  Arkansas  Central  (narrow  gauge)  railroad  scheme  was  conducted.  This  road 
is  now  in  operation  from  Helena  to  Clarendon,  and  is  eventually  to  be  completed 
to  Little  Rock.  It  traverses  one  of  the  best  cotton-producing  regions  in  the  South. 
Its  completion  is  hindered  by  the  anomalous  condition  of  affairs  in  the  State,  and 
by  the  various  accusations  brought  against  its  builders  as  to  the  manner  in  which 
they  obtained  the  money  to  build  it  with.  The  Little  Rock,  Pine  Bluff  and  New 
Orleans  road  now  runs  from  Chicot  to  Pine  Bluff,  and  will  this  year  reach  Little 
Rock.  The  Mississippi,  Ouachita  and  Red  River  road  is  intended  to  run  across 
the  State  from  Chicot,  on  the  Mississippi,  to  Texarcana,  on  the  Red  river.  The 
Ouachita  Valley  road  extends  from  Arkadelphia  to  Camden,  and  thence  will  con- 
nect with  Monroe  in  Louisiana.  Camden  is  one  of  the  largest  towns  in  Southern 
Arkansas,  in  the  heart  of  a  fine  cotton- growing  section.  It  will  be  seen  that  as 
soon  as  these  projected  lines  are  completed,  Arkansas  will  be  very  thoroughly 
traversed  by  roads,  and,  with  her  splendid  river  highways,  will  find  no  difficulty 
in  annually  sending  an  early  crop  to  Memphis  and  New  Orleans.  Steamers  can 
reach  Camden  from  New  Orleans  coming  up  the  Red  and  Ouachita  rivers,  and 
thousands  of  bales  of  cotton  annually  go  to  New  Orleans  that  way.  But  these 
facilities  for  communication  cannot  enrich  the  State  so  long  as  an  appeal  to  arms 
by  a  discontented  faction  may  at  any  time  overthrow  law,  destroy  order,  and  turn 
towns  into  camps.  There  seems  to  have  been,  since  the  close  of  the  war,  the 
most  bitter  struggle  between  the  different  factions,  sometimes  resulting  in  blood- 
shed, and  always  in  a  paralysis  of  the  State's  vitality  for  some  time  after  the 
combat.  The  partisans  in  a  State  where  the  use  of  arms  is  so  common  as  it  is  in 
Arkansas  are,  of  course,  violent  and  vindictive,  and  a  good  many  lives  are  wasted 
in  useless  struggling  to  prevent  those  sudden  changes  in  party  sentiment  which 
are  inevitable..  When  Governor  Clayton  was  elected  to  the  United  States  Sena- 
torship,  he  was  seemingly  unwilling  to  allow  his  successor  to  take  his  office,  for 
fear  that  he  might  change  the  course  of  the  party.  So,  recently,  the  Republican 
Governor  now  in  office,  having  inaugurated  his  course  by  promising  something 
like  an  honest  administration,  and  by  uniting  around  him  the  more  reputable  of 
the  old  Conservatives — in  other  words,  by  bringing  politics,  to  a  certain  extent, 
back  to  their  normal  condition,  and  not  controlling  the  intelligent  property- 
owners  by  ignorant  and  incompetent  office-holders — was  temporarily  ousted  by 
the  beaten  candidate,  who  brought  a  formidable  army  at  his  back,  expelled  the 


THE      ARKANSAS      WAR TAXES RESOURCES.  285 

rightful  Governor,  Mr.  Baxter,  and  opened  the  way  to  a  series  of  arrests  and 
counter-arrests,  which  would  have  been  laughable  had  they  not  been  so  disgust- 
ing to  any  one  possessing  a  high  ideal  of  republican  government.  It  required  the 
interference  of  the  Federal  Government  to  secure  the  reinstatement  of  Governor 
Baxter,  and  the  would-be  usurper,  who  had  mustered  at  his  back  a  Falstaman 
army  of  idle  and  worthless  fellows,  retired  only  when  the  proclamation  of  the 
President  warned  him  to  do  so.  The  re-establishment  of  law  and  order  was 
followed  by  a  popular  vote  on  the  question  of  holding  a  new  constitutional  con- 
vention. The  election  occurred  in  July,  and  the  people  of  the  State  affirmed, 
by  more  than  seventy  thousand  majority,  their  desire  for  a  convention.  Several 
important  amendments  to  the  constitution  will,  doubtless,  be  made ;  some  of  the 
elder  Democrats  have  already  manifested  a  disposition  to  return  to  the  illiberal 
ante-bellum  policy  with  regard  to  general  taxation- 
Taxes  in  the  State  now  are  nearly  six  per  cent.  The  vicious  system  of 
issuing  State  warrants  is  pursued  in  Arkansas  as  in  Louisiana,  and  with  the  same 
disastrous  results.  A  stern  reign  of  law  and  order  for  four  years  would  fill 
Arkansas  with  immigrants ;  but  a  coup  d'etat  every  four  years  will  not  be  very 
reassuring.  The  Legislature  should  enact  a  law  forbidding  the  bearing  of  arms, 
and  should  enforce  it  if  possible.  Murder  is  considered  altogether  too  trivial  an 
offense  in  Arkansas.  I  walked  through  the  Penitentiary  at  Little  Rock,  and  saw 
a  large  number  of  white  and  black  criminals  who  were  serving  life,  or  long  term 
sentences  for  homicide.  A  brace  of  negroes  working  at  the  prison  forge  were 
murderers;  an  old  man,  peacefully  toiling  at  a  carpenter's  bench,  was  a  murderer; 
a  young  negro,  hewing  a  log,  was  a  murderer;  and  in  a  dark  cell,  a  murderer, 
stretched  on  his  iron  bedstead,  was  sleeping  off  the  terrors  which  had  partially 
subsided  with  the  reprieve  just  sent  him.  The  Governor  had  fifteen  proclama- 
tions, offering  rewards  for  murderers,  flying  about  the  State  at  the  date  of  my 
visit.  The  day  before  I  left  Little  Rock,  however,  a  desperado  was  hung  in  the 
neighboring  town  of  Clarksville,  and  it  was  thought  that  the  execution  would 
have  a  salutary  effect  on  the  lawless  element. 

The  resources  of  Arkansas  are,  like  those  of  all  the  other  Southern  and  South- 
western States,  as  yet  but  little  drawn  upon  by  the  resident  population;  and  they 
are  immense.  Arkansas  contains  twelve  thousand  square  miles  of  coal,*  and  a 
valuable  coal-basin  is  situated  along  both  sides  of  the  Arkansas  river.  In  Sebas- 
tian county  there  are  veins  from  three  to  six  feet  thick.  A  lead  belt  extends 
diagonally  across  the  State ;  the  lead  and  silver  mines  in  Sevier  county  promise 
much  clay.  Kaolin,  gypsum,  copper,  and  zinc  are  found  in  profusion,  manganese, 
ochre,  and  paint- earths  are  to  be  had  in  many  counties ;  and  there  are  vast 
quarries  of  slate,  whetstone,  limestone,  and  marble.  Iron  ore  has  been  discov- 
ered at  various  points;  but  the  coal -stores  are  the  great  treasure,  and  must 
some  time  enrich  the  State. 

The  St.  Louis,  Iron  Mountain,  and  Southern  railroad  has  brought  the  Hot 
Springs,  that  famous  Bethesda  of  the  rheumatic  and  scrofulous  unfortunate,  within 
convenient    distance    of  a    Pullman    palace- car.      The   staging  is   now  eighteen 

*  Testimony  of  the  State  Geologist. 


286 


THE      HOT      SPRINGS      OF     ARKANSAS. 


instead  of  eighty-five  miles  to  this  Bad-Gastein  of  America,  which  lies  in  a  wild, 
mountainous  region  near  the  line  of  the  St.  Louis,  Southern  and  Iron  Mountain 
road.  The  hot  springs  issue  from  the  western  slope  of  a  spur  of  the  Ozark 
range,  about  fourteen  hundred  feet  above  the  sea-level.  There  are  now  nearly 
sixty  of  these  springs,  new  ones  appearing  annually.  Their  temperature 
varies  from  ninety- five  to  one  hundred  and  fifty  degrees  Fahrenheit,  and  they 
discharge  something  like  three  hundred  gallons  per  minute.  Thousands  of 
discouraged  pilgrims  flock  to  Hot  Springs  yearly,  and  return  much  recovered  ; 
while  those  who  do  not  achieve  a  cure  experience  great  relief.  The  town  lies  in 
a  valley  which  follows  the  Hot  Spring  creek,   and  is  very  well    supplied   with 


The  Hot  Springs,  Arkansas. 

hotels  and  neat  but  inexpensive  residences.  I  did  not  penetrate  to  the  Springs 
but  heard  very  powerful  testimony  in  their  behalf.  It  is  expected,  and,  I  think' 
desired,  that  the  United  States,  which  has  a  disputed  claim  to  the  "  Hot  Springs 
reservation,"  should  succeed  in  getting  possession,  and  making  the  valley  a  grand 
sanitary  resort  free  to  the  people. 

The  forests  of  Arkansas  offer  the  most  stupendous  chances  for  the  develop- 
ment of  State  wealth.  The  yellow  pine  and  cypress,  the  cedar,  the  cottonwood, 
the  mulberry,  the  oaks,  hickories,  pecans,  and  ash,  can  be  borne  easily  to  market 
on  the  bosoms  of  the  great  currents  near  which  they  grow.  There  are  still 
eight  millions  of  acres  of  land  belonging  to  the  United  States  subject  to  home- 
stead entry,  and  these  are  among  the  best  in  Arkansas.  A  decent  State 
government,  and  the  progress  of  education  among  the  masses,  would  enable  the 
State  to  leap  into  as  wonderful  a  growth  as  that  achieved  by  Texas  and  Missouri. 
But  there  is  a  great  deal  to  do  before  that  prosperity  can  be  achieved. 


XXX. 


VICKSBURG    AND    NATCHEZ,    MISSISSIPPI SOCIETY    AND    POLITICS. 

A    LOUISIANA    PARISH    JURY. 


THE  journey  along  the  Mississippi  river  from  Napoleon,  on  the  Arkansas 
shore,  to  Vicksburg,  the  largest  town  in  the  State  of  Mississippi,  discloses 
naught  save  vast  and  gloomy  stretches  of  forest  and  fiat,  of  swamp  and  inlet,  of 
broad  current  and  green  island,  until  Columbia,  a  pretty  town  on  the  Arkansas 
side,  is  passed.  Below  Columbia  the  banks  of  the  river  are  lined  with  cotton 
plantations  for  more  than  150  miles. 

Vicksburg,  the  tried  and  troubled  hill- city,  her  crumbling  bluffs  still  filled 
with  historic  memorials  of  one  of  the  most  desperate  sieges  and  defences  of 
modern  times,  rises  in  quite  imposing  fashion  from  the  Mississippi's  banks  in  a 


Vicksburg,  Mississippi. 

loop  in  the  river,  made  by  a  long  delta,  which  at  high  water  is  nearly  submerged. 
The  bluffs  run  back  some  distance  to  an  elevated  plateau.  In  the  upper  streets 
are  many  handsome  residences.  The  Court- House  has  climbed  to  the  summit 
of  a  fine  series  of  terraces;  here  and  there  a  pretty  church  serves  as  a  land-mark; 
and  the  remains  of  the  old  fort  from  which  "  Whistling  Dick,"  a  famous  Confed- 
19 


288 


THE      "NATIONAL     CEMETERY"      AT      VICKSBURG. 


erate  gun,  was  wont  to  sing  defiance  to  the  Federals,  are  still  visible  on  a  lofty 
eminence.  From  the  grass-grown  ramparts  one  can  see  "Grant's  Cut-off"  in  the 
distance ;  overlook  the  principal  avenue — Washington  street,  well-lined  with 
spacious  shops  and  stores,  and  unhappily  filled  at  all  hours  with  lounging 
negroes ;  can  see  the  broad  current  sweeping  round  the  tongue  of  land  on  which 
the  towns  of  De  Soto  and  Delta  stand,  and  the  ferries  plying  to  the  landings  of 
the  railroad  which  cuts  across  North  Louisiana  to  Shreveport ;  can  see  the  almost 
perpendicular  streets  scaling  the  bluff  from  the  water-side,  and,  down  by  the  river, 
masses  of  elevator's  and  warehouses,  whence  the  white,  stately  packets  come  and 
go.  There  is  evidence  of  growth;  neat  houses  are  scattered  on  hill  and  in  valley 
in  every  direction;  yet  the  visitor  will  find  that  money  is  scarce,  credit  is  poor, 
and  that  every  tradesman  is  badly  discouraged. 

The  river  is  so  intricate  in  its  turnings  that  one  is  at  first  puzzled  on  seeing  a 
steamboat  passing,  to  know  whether  it  is  ascending  or  descending;  at  the  end  of 
the  "loop,"  near  the  mouth  of  the  Yazoo  river,  and  at  the  point  where  Sherman 
made  his  entrance  from  the  "  Valley  of  Death,"  is  the  largest  national  cemetery 


HySy 


The  National  Cemetery  at  Vicksburg,  Mississippi. 

in  the  country,  in  whose  grassy  plats  repose  the  mortal  remains  of  sixteen  thou- 
sand soldiers.  The  view  from  the  slopes  of  the  cemetery,  reached  by  many  a 
detour  through  dusty  cuts  in  the  hills,  is  too  fiat  to  be  grandiose,  but  ample 
enough  to  be  inspiring.  The  wooded  point;  the  cross-current  setting  around  it ; 
the  wide  sweep  away  toward  the  bend,  are  all  charming.  The  old  Scotch  gar- 
dener and  sexton  told  me  that  twelve  thousand  of  the  graves  were  marked 
"unknown."  The  original  design  contemplated  the  planting  of  the  cemetery 
with  tree-bordered  avenues  intended  to  resemble  the  aisles  and  nave  of  a  cathe- 
dral. This  was  impracticable;  but  oaks  have  been  planted  throughout  the  ground, 
and  the  graves  were  covered  with  lovely  blossoms.  The  section  of  Vicksburg 
between  the  cemetery  and  the  town  is  not  unlike  the  park  of  the  Buttes  Chau- 
mont  in  Paris.  Grapes  grow  wild  in  the  adjacent  valleys,  and  might  readily  be 
cultivated  on  the  hill- sides.  A  simple  marble  shaft  in  the  cemetery  is  destined  to 
commemorate  the  spot  where  Grant  held  his  famous  interview  with  Pemberton. 

Vicksburg  has  acquired  a  not  altogether  enviable  notoriety  as  a  town  where 
shooting  at  sight  is  a  popular  method  of  vengeance,  and,  shortly  before  my 
second  visit  there,  three  murders  were  committed  by  men  who  deemed  it  manly 
to  take  the  law  into  their  own  hands.      There  is  still  rather  too  much  of  this 


DUELING COLONEL     VICK. 


289 


The  Gamblers'  Graves — Vicksburg,   Mississippi. 


barbarism  remaining  in  Mississippi,  and  it  has  not  always  the  excuse  of  intoxica- 
tion to  palliate  it.  The  Vicksburg  method  seems  not  to  be  the  duel,  but  cold- 
blooded murder.  The  laws  of  the  duello  are  pretty  thoroughly  expunged  in 
Mississippi,  although  I  was  not  a  little  ___  _ 

amused  to  learn  from  Governor  Ames  ISBilttBi|k 

that  the  ultra-Democratic  people  in 
those  counties  of  the  State  border- 
ing on  Louisiana  refused  in  any  man- 
ner to  aid  the  authorities  in  securing 
duelists  who  steal  out  from  New 
Orleans  to  fight  on  Mississippi  soil, 

on    the    ground    that    the   "  d d 

Yankees  want  to  do  away  with  duel- 
ing so  as  to  make  their  own  heads 
safe."  Mississippi  is  a  sparsely  settled 
State,  and  in  some  of  the  counties 
life  is  yet  as  rough  as  on  the  South- 
western frontier.  But  that  open  and 
deliberate  murder  should  be  encouraged  in  a  city  of  fifteen  thousand  inhabitants, 
where  there  is  good  society,  and  where  church  and  school  flourish,  is  monstrous ! 
Vicksburg  was  once  the  scene  of  a  terrible  popular  vengeance.  A  number 
of  gamblers  persisted  in  remaining  in  the  town  against  the  wishes  of  the  citizens, 

and  having  shown  fight  and  killed  one 
or  two  townsmen,  they  were  them- 
selves lynched,  and  buried  among  the 
bluffs.  The  town  gets  its  name  from 
one    of   the    oldest    and    most    highly 


respected  families  in  Mississippi, — the 
Vicks, — whose  family  mansion  stands 
on  a  handsome  eminence  in  the  town 
of  to-day.  Colonel  Vick,  the  present 
representative  of  the  family,  is  a  speci- 
men of  the  noble-looking  men  grown 
in  the  Mississippi  valley, — six  feet  four 
in  stature,  erect  and  stately,  with  the 
charming  courtesy  of  the  old  school. 
The  picture  which  our  artist  has  given 
of  him  does  justice  only  to  the  fine, 
manly  face ;  it  cannot  reproduce  the 
form  and  the  manner.  Mississippi 
raises  noble  men,  and  they  were  won- 
derful soldiers,  showing  pluck,  persist- 
ence, and  grip.  Nineteen  lines  of 
steam-packets  ply  between  New  Orleans  and  Vicksburg,  and  from  Vicksburg 
uo  the  Yazoo  river.     The  scene  in  the  elevators  at  the  river-side,  as  in  Memphis, 


Colonel  Vick,  of  Vicksburg,  Mississippi,  Planter. 


29O  LANDINGS SURREPTITIOUS      WHISKEY. 

is  in  the  highest  degree  animated.  Thousands  of  bales  and  barrels  roll  and 
tumble  down  the  gangways  which  communicate  with  the  boats,  and  the  shouting 
is  terrific.  The  railroad  from  Vicksburg  to  Jackson,  the  Mississippian  capital, 
runs  through  the  scene  of  some  of  the  heaviest  fighting  of  the  war,  crossing  the 
Big  Black  river,  and  passing  Edwards  and  other  nourishing  towns,  set  down 
between  charming  forests  and  rich  cotton-fields. 

Sailing  on  through  the  submerged  country  from  Vicksburg  was  sorrowful 
work ;  every  one  was  depressed  with  imminent  disaster.  We  passed  into  the 
great  bend,  or  lake,  where,  on  Hurricane  Island,  lie  the  plantations  formerly 
owned  by  the  Davis  Brothers, — famous  for  their  wealth.  The  broad  acres  once 
known  as  the  property  of  Jefferson  Davis  are  now  in  the  hands  of  his  ex-slave, 
who,  by  the  way,  is  said  to  be  a  miracle  of  thrift  and  intelligence. 

Negroes  were  toiling  in  the  mud  at.  some  of  the  landings,  building 
ineffectual  dams,  around  which  the  current  of  the  great  river,  sooner  or 
later,  remorselessly  ran.  The  white  men,  splashing  along  the  overflowed 
roads  on  horseback,  looked  grimly  courageous,  and  gave  their  orders  in  a 
cool,  collected  manner.  The  whole  land  seemed  one  treacherous  morass; 
the    outlook    was    very    discouraging. 

We  passed  several  rude  villages  on  the  eastern  bank,  which  had  been  built  by 
colonies  of  negroes,  who  had  fled  as  the  floods  came  upon  them.  These  blacks 
gain  a  precarious  livelihood  by  cutting  wood  and  growing  chickens  for  passing 
steamers ;  they  depend  on  the  captains  of  the  boats  for  their  supplies  of  corn- 
meal,  molasses,  pork  and  whiskey,  and  are  sometimes  reduced  almost  to  starva- 
tion when  their  natural  recklessness  and  improvidence  have  resulted  in  empty 
larders. 

At  one  of  these  primitive  settlements,  known  as  "Waterproof"  (it  was  by  no 
means  proof  against  the  water,  however),  there  were  once  two  negro  preachers 
who  were  extravagantly  fond  of  whiskey.  As  each  desired  to  maintain  in  the 
eyes  of  the  other  a  reputation  for  strictest  temperance,  some  secrecy  in  procuring 
the  supplies  of  the  coveted  article  was  necessary,  and  each  made  the  clerk  of  the 
"  Great  Republic"  his  confidant.  Whenever  the  boat  stopped  at  "Waterproof," 
the  preachers  were  promptly  on  hand,  each  one  obtaining  of  the  clerk  a 
private  interview,  and  imploring  him  to  bring,  on  the  return  trip,  a  good  keg 
of  whiskey,  carefully  enveloped,  so  that  "  dat  udder  nigger"  should  not  know 
what  it  was.  When  the  clerk  complied,  he  received  at  the  hands  of  the  grateful 
preachers  thank-offerings  of  chickens  and  fat  ducklings,  and  whenever  he  mis- 
chievously threatened  to  expose  the  reverend  sinners,  he  would  hear  the  fright- 
ened words: 

"  'Fo'  de  Lord,  you  's  gwine  to  ruin  me  !" 

When  the  river  destroys  the  land  upon  which  the  negroes  have  built  a  town, 
and  tumbles  their  cabins  and  their  little  church  into  the  current,  they  retire  to 
the  higher  lands,  a  few  miles  back,  or  seek  a  new  water-side  location.  They 
cultivate  but  little  corn,  and  give  much  of  their  time  to  merry-makings,  "  meet- 
ings," mule  races,  and  long  journeys  from  one  settlement  to  another,,  As  we 
passed  a  little  village  where  there  were,  perhaps,  a  hundred  negroes,  comfort- 


FREE      NIGGERS. 


291 


ably  installed  in  weather-proof  cabins,  a  passenger  on  the  "  Great  Republic," 
who  was  a  planter  of  the  old  regime,  indulged  in  the  following  monologue : 

"  Thar  's  what  they  call  free  niggers.     Thar  's  a  change  from  a  few  years  ago, 
sir.      Them  poor  things  thar  are  just  idlin'  away  their  time,  I  reckon  ;  and  you 

notice,  they  're  mighty  ragged  and  destitute  lookin.'     Thar 's  a  d d  nigger 

a-ridin'  a  mule,  as  comfortable  like  as  ye  please.  Not  much  like  the  old  times, 
when  they  were  all  working  quiet-like  in  the  fields.  Sundays  yo  'd  seen  'em  in 
their  clean  white  clothes,  singin'  and  shoutin'  or  may  be  doin'  a  bit  of  fishin',  and 
at  night,  when  the  plantation  bell  rung,  agoin'  peaceful  as  lambs  to  quarters. 
Now  it  's  all  frolic.      I  reckon  they  '11  starve.      What  kin  they  do  alone,  sir  ?" 


Natchez-under-the-Hill,  Mississippi. 

"  I  hain't  nothin'  agin  a  free  nigger,"  said  a  tall  native  of  Mississippi  bound 
for  Texas,  "  but  I  don't  want  him  to  say  a  word  to  me.  The  world's  big  enough 
for  us  both,  I  reckon.  We  ain't  made  to  live  together  under  this  new  style  o' 
things.  Free  niggers  and  me  could  n't  agree."  And  the  two  spat  sympa- 
thetically. 

The  negroes  in  the  valley  cheered  the  "Great  Republic"  as  she  passed;  the 
swart  mothers,  fondling  their  babes,  looked  up  and  waved  their  hands,  and  some 
of  the  men  doffed  their  hats,  unconsciously  retaining  the  respectful  manner  which 
they  had  been  forced  to  observe  under  the  stern  domination  of  slavery. 

The  western  bank  of  the  river  below  Vicksburg,  even  to  the  Gulf  of  Mexico, 
is  within  the  bounds  of  Louisiana.     The  eastern  bank,  to  a  point  nearly  oppo- 


292 


CENTURY      MAN" NATCHEZ-UNDER  -THE-  HILL. 


View  in  Brown's  Garden — Natchez,  Mississippi.     [Page  293.] 


site  the  Red  river,  is  in  Mississippi.  The  characteristics  of  the  river-side 
populations  in  both  States  are  much  the  same.  The  negroes  in  many  of  the 
counties  are  largely  in  the  majority,  and  hold  responsible  offices.  One  of  the 
prominent  citizens  of  Natchez,  who  was  in  former  days  a  man  of  large  wealth, 

owning  several  hundred  negroes,  was 
sitting  on  his  verandah  one  day,  when  a 
negro  with  a  book  under  his  arm  ap- 
proached, and  with  the  dignity  befitting 
a  state  official,  said  to  the  Caucasian: 
"  I 's  de  century-man,  sah  !  " 
He  was  the  officer  appointed  to  take 
the  census  for  the  county.  He  could 
not  read  well,  and  his  chirography  was 
painful,  but  he  showed  diligence  and 
determination. 

Grand  Gulf,  in  Mississippi,  is  a 
pretty  town,  lying  on  romantic  hills, 
whose  bases  are  bathed  by  the  great 
stream.  A  railway  extends  from  Grand  Gulf  to  Port  Gibson,  eight  miles  dis- 
tant, and  a  thriving  trade  is  done  with  the  interior.  The  hills  overhanging  the 
river  were  advantageous  positions  for  the  Confederates  in  war  time,  and  the 
Federal  fleet  of  gun-boats  shelled  the  town  and  its  battery-crowned  heights  in 
1862.  Below  Grand  Gulf  there  are  no  towns  of  importance  on  either  side  of 
the  river  until  Natchez,  one  of  the  loveliest  of  Southern  towns,  and  without 
exception  the  most  beautiful  in   Mississippi,  is  reached. 

Natchez,  like  Vicksburg,  lies  on  a  line  of  bluffs  which  rear  their  bold  heads 
from  the  water  in  an  imposing  manner.  He  who  sees  only  Natchez-under-the- 
Hill  from  a  steamboat's  deck  gets  an  impression  of  a  few  prosaic  houses  hud- 
dled together  not  far  from  a  wharf-boat,  a  road  leading  up  a  steep  and  high  hill, 
and  here  and  there  masses  of  foliage.  Let  him  wander  ashore,  and  scale  the 
cliff,  and  he  will  find  himself  in  a  quiet,  unostentatious,  beautifully  shaded  town, 
from  which,  so  oppressive  at  first  is  the  calm,  he  almost  fancies 

"  Life  and  thought  are  gone  away ;  " 

but  he  finds  cheeriest  of  people, —  cheery,  too,  under  heavy  misfortunes, —  and 
homes  rich  in  refinement  and  half  buried  under  the  lustrous  and  voluptuous 
blossoms  which  the  wonderful  climate  favors.  Natchez  has  an  impressive  cathe- 
dral, a  fine  court-house,  a  handsome  Masonic  temple,  and  hosts  of  pretty  houses. 
You  walk  beneath  the  shade  of  the  China-tree  and  the  water  oak,  the  cedar 
and  the  laurimunda.  Nowhere  is  there  glare  of  sun  on  the  pavement ;  nothing 
more  clamorous  than  the  galloping  of  a  horse  stirs  the  blood  of  the  nine  thou- 
sand inhabitants. 

There  were,  before  the  war,  great  numbers  of  planters'  residences  in  the 
suburbs, — beautiful  houses,  with  colonnades  and  verandahs,  with  rich  drawing 
and  dining-rooms,  furnished  in  heavy  antique  style,  and  gardens  modeled  after  the 


GARDENS  —  BROWNS  —  SHIELDS 


■NEGRO     OFFICIALS. 


293 


finest  in  Europe.  Many  of  these  homes  have  been  destroyed.  We  visited  one  or 
two  whose  owners  have  been  fortunate  enough  to  keep  them.  The  lawns  and 
gardens  are  luxurious.  The  Mississippian  wealth  of  roses  is  inconceivable  to 
him  who  has  not  visited  such  gardens  as  Brown's,  in  Natchez-under-the-Hill,  and 
that  of  Mr.  Shields,  in  the  suburbs  of  the  upper  town.  I  remember  no  palace 
garden  in  Europe  which  impressed  me  so  powerfully  with  the  sense  of  richness 
and  exquisite  profusion  of  costly  and  delicate  blooms  as  Brown's,  at  Natchez, 
which  a  wealthy  Scotchman  cultivated  for  a  quarter  of  a  century,  and  handed 
down  to  his  family,  with  injunctions  to  maintain  its  splendor. 

From  the  bluff  above  this  indescribably  charming  spot  one  can  overlook  the 
plain  of  Concordia,  in  Louisiana,  on  the  west  side  the  broad,  tranquil  river,  and 
catch  the  gleam  of  the  lake  among  the  mammoth  trees. 

There  are  still  many  wealthy  families  in  Natchez,  independent  of  the  war  and 
its  abasements.  Here  and  there  a  French  name  and  tradition  remind  one  that 
the  town  is  of  French  origin,  that  D'Iberville  founded  it  in  1700,  and  that 
Bienville  once  had  a  trading-post  there  among  the  Natchez  Indians.  There 
that  tribe,  fire-worshipers  and  noble  savages,  passed  an  innocent  and  Arcadian 
existence,  keeping  ever  alight  on  their  altars  a  fire  in  honor  of  the  sun.  But  the 
white  man  came ;  the  fire  on  the  altars  went  out ;  the  Indian  was  swept  away. 
Gayarre,  who  has  written  well  concerning  these  Southern  Indian  tribes,  says  the 
Natchez  were  the  Athenians  of  Louisiana,  as  the  Choctaws  were  the  Boeotians.  A 
hundred  years  after  the  Natchez  had  first  seen  the  French,  Fort  Rosalie,  on 
the  bluff, — its  site  is  still  pointed  out  to  the  stranger, — was  evacuated  by  the 
Spaniards,  that  the  flag  of  the  United  States  might  be  raised  over  it,  and 
since  1803  Natchez  has  been  an  incorporated  American  city.  It  has  no  manu- 
factures now ;  its  trade  depends  entirely  on  cotton.  No  railroad  reaches  it, 
but  a  narrow-gauge,  called  the  Natchez,  Jackson,  and  Columbus  road,  has  been 
begun.  The  adjoining  counties  furnish  from  five  to  twenty  thousand  bales  of 
cotton  annually,  which  are  shipped  to  New  Orleans  for  sale. 

Natchez  was  out  of  debt  when  it  was  given  over  to  the  Republican  party,  but 
has  acquired  quite  a  heavy  indebtedness  since.  The  negroes  came  into  power 
there  in  1867.  The  present  Sheriff,  the  County  Treasurer  and  Assessor,  the 
majority    of   the    magistrates,    and  all 

the    officers    managing  county  affairs,  /*l^<-  ■■■\ 

except  one,  are  negroes.  The  Board 
of  Aldermen  has  three  negroes  in  it. 
There  is  the  usual  complaint  among 
the  Conservatives  that  money  has  been 
dishonestly  and  foolishly  expended; 
but  the  government  of  the  city 
seemed,  on  the  whole,  very  satisfac- 
tory. About  a  thousand  children  are 
at  school  in  the  public  schools,  and 
four   hundred  of  them, — the   colored 

pupils, have  a  handsome  new  School-  Avenue  in  Brown's  Garden— Natchez,  Mississippi. 


294  MIXED      SCHOOLS THE      CEMETERY. 

house,  called  the  "  Union,"  built  expressly  for  them.  Natchez  had  an  excellent 
system  of  public  schools  before  the  war,  and  the  "  Natchez  Institute,"  the 
original  free-school,  is  still  kept  up.  The  Catholic  institutions  are  numerous 
and  thriving.     A  good  many  of  the  negroes,  as  in  Louisiana,  are  Catholics. 

One-half  of  the  population  of  Natchez  is  black,  and  seems  to  live  on 
terms  of  amity  with  the  white  half.  White  and  black  children  play  together 
in  the  streets,  and  one  sometimes  feels  like  asking  "  Why,  if  that  be  so,  should 


A  Mississippi  River  Steamer  arriving  at  Natchez  in  the  Night. 

they  not  go  to  school  together?"  But  the  people  of  Mississippi,  like  the  people 
throughout  the  South,  will  not  hear  of  mixed  schools.  The  negroes  are  vocifer- 
ously prominent  as  hackmen,  wharfmen,  and  public  servants  generally;  but  they 
do  not  like  to  leave  the  town  and  settle  down  to  hard  work  on  the  worn-out  hills 
at  the  back  of  the  city. 

On  the  bluffs,  some  three  miles  from  the  town,  is  a  national  cemetery, 
beautifully  planned  and  decorated,  and  between  it  and  Natchez  stands  the  dilapi- 
dated United  States  Marine  Hospital,  and  the  grass-grown  ramparts  of  Fort 
McPherson  mark  the  site  of  a  beautiful  mansion  which  was  razed  for  military 
purposes.  When  its  owner,  a  rich  Frenchman,  was  offered  compensation  by 
the  army  officer  superintending  the  work,  he  gruffly  refused  it,  saying  that  he 
had  enough  still  left  to  buy  the  United  States  Government. 


TAXATION  —  A      "PARISH     JURY" "DAVE     YOUNG."  295 

The  taxes  in  Natchez  and  vicinity  are  very  oppressive,  amounting  to  nearly 
six  per  cent.  The  State  and  county  tax  touches  four  per  cent,  and  is  based  on 
full  two- thirds  the  valuation.  The  railroad  movement  has,  however,  done  some- 
thing to  increase  these  burdens. 

Many  of  the  Natchez  planters  own  plantations  on  the  Louisiana  side  of  the 
river,  but,  of  course,  have  no  political  influence  there,  and  are  dependent  on  the 
negroes  for  the  local  legislation  necessary  to  secure  them  in  their  rights,  and  for 
measures  to  prevent  inundation.  I  attended  a  session  of  a  parish  jury  in  Vidalia, 
opposite  Natchez,  and  was  surprised  to  find  it  almost  entirely  composed  of 
blacks.  The  white  planters,  with  whom  I  conversed  grumbled  bitterly  over 
their  hard  fate,  and  recounted  thrilling  stories  of  the  exploits  of  carpet-baggers 
in  their  vicinity.  From  the  tone  of  their  conversation,  it  was  easy  to  see  that 
they  believed  these  carpet-baggers  had  misled  the  negroes,  who  would  otherwise 
have  been  well  enough  disposed. 

The  jury,  whose  office  corresponds,  so  far  as  I  could  learn,  very  much  to  that 
of  our  county  commissioners  in  the  Northern  States,  comprised  men  of  various 
grades  of  intelligence.  One  or  two  of  the  negroes  were  well  dressed,  and  quiet 
and  gentlemanly  in  their  manners  ;  the  others  were  slouching,  unkempt,  suspicious 
in  their  demeanor,  and  evidently  unfit  for  any  public  duty.  The  planters  addressed 
them  familiarly,  stating  their  needs,  and  making  hearty  appeals  to  the  common 
sense  of  the  most  intelligent  of  the  number.  As  the  inundation  was  rapidly  in- 
vading all  the  neighboring  lands,  the  negroes  recognized  the  necessity  of  action. 

At  Vidalia  I  also  met  one  of  the  prominent  negro  members  of  the  Louisiana 
Legislature,  Mr.  David  Young,  a  coal  black  man.  When  I  first  saw  him  he  was 
addressing  a  row  of  his  fellow-citizens,  who  were  seated  upon  a  fence  in  that 
nerveless,  unexpectant  attitude  so  characteristic  of  the  lowland  negro.  As  an 
election  was  about  to  occur  in  Vidalia,  he  was  endeavoring  to  impress  on  the 
colored  voters  the  necessity  of  electing  reform  officers,  and  indulged  in  some 
general  remarks  on  the  importance  of  a  purification  of  Louisiana  politics. 
Brandishing  his  ballots,  he  warned  the  listeners  to  vote  for  honest  representa- 
tives ;   whereupon  one  ragged  negro  said  sullenly  : 

"  I 's  done  gwine  to  vote  to  suit  myself.  Dave  Young  nor  no  udder  man 
ain't  gwine  to  tell  me  nothin'  'bout  my  vote." 

Mr.  Young  then  proceeded  to  explain  to  them  that  Northern  sentiment 
was  beginning  to  rebel  against  the  misrule  at  the  South,  and  that  the  colored 
voters  throughout  the  State  must  be  "wise  in  time."  The  listeners  shook  their 
heads  suspiciously,  although  evidently  impressed  with  what  they  had  heard.  As 
we  drew  near,  and  entered  into  conversation,  Mr.  Young  turned  his  attention  to 
us,  and  expressed  himself  desirous  of  a  fair  government  in  the  State  for  both 
whites  and  blacks.  While  he  gave  his  views,  in  plain  but  well  chosen  language, 
I  noticed  that  the  other  negroes  listened  intently,  making  whispered  comments 
on  his  remarks.  They  were  far  from  friendly  toward  Young,  as  he  was  a  candi- 
date for  re-election  to  the  Legislature  against  a  white  man  who  had  a  notoriously 
evil  reputation  as  a  carpet-bagger,  yet  who  had  obtained  the  firm  support  of  a 
majority  of  the  negroes  in  ths  parish. 


296 


BETTER     THAN     A      CARPET-BAGGER. 


"We  do  not  object,"  said  one  planter  to  me,  as  we  left  Vidalia,  "to  the 
presence  of  the  negro  in  the  parish  jury,  we  complain  because  nine  out  of  ten 
who  sit  upon  the  jury  are  ignorant  and  have  no  property  at  all,  and  yet  are 
permitted  to  judge  of.  what  is  best  for  the  interests  of  property- holders.  We  are 
often  compelled  to  submit  questions  of  vital  importance  to  the  judgment  of  irre- 
sponsible and  suspicious  fellows,  who,  because  they  are  opposed  to  us  politically, 
seem  to  think  it  their  bounden  duty  to  do  nothing  for  our  material  well-being. 
But  such  men  as  Dave  Young  do  some  good.  They  are  teaching  the  negroes 
a  little  prudence  and  moderation.  I  would  rather  have  a  nigger  like  David,  than 
a  white  man  like "  (mentioning  the  wicked  carpet-bagger). 


'Sah? 


XXXI. 

LIFE     ON     COTTON     PLANTATIONS. 

DURING  my  stay  in  Natchez,  one  of  the  many  gentlemen  interested  in 
cotton-planting  on  the  west  or  Louisiana  side  of  the  river,  invited 
me  to  accompany  him  on  a  tour  of  inspection.  The  rapidly-rising  river  threat- 
ened to  inundate  the  lands  on  which  hundreds  of  negroes  had  been  expending 
weeks  of  patient  care,  and  the  planter  felt  it  his  duty  to  take  a  horseback  ride 
over  the  trio  of  plantations  under  his  charge ;  so  we  crossed  the  Mississippi,  and 
rode  twelve  miles  into  the  interior  of  Louisiana. 

On  the  road,  which  led  along  the  lovely  banks  of  Lake  Concordia,  the  planter 
chatted  of  some  of  the  vexations  by  which  he  is  daily  beset,  and  spoke  rather 
hopelessly  of  the  labor  problem.  The  condition  of  society,  too,  he  thought  very 
bad,  and  that  it  was  an  actual  hindrance  to  the  development  of  the  section. 

"Are  the  negroes,"  I  asked  him,  "  aggressive  and  insolent  toward  the  white 
people  ?  " 

But  as  the  planter  was  about  to  answer  this  question,  we  approached  a  ferry- 
boat, or  barge,  in  which  we  were  to  cross  an  arm  of  the  lake  to  the  island  on 
which  my  friend's  plantations  were  situated.  An  old  negro  man,  much  the  worse 
for  liquor,  was  preparing  to  monopolize  the  boat  with  his  mule-team,  but  held 
back  the  mules,  and  touched  his  hat  with  drunken  courtesy  as  we  came  up. 

"Stand  aside,  uncle,"  said  the  planter  firmly,  but  very  politely;  "we  wish  to 
cross  at  once,  and  there  is  not  room  for  us  all." 

"  Yas,  sah ;  yas,  Colonel,"  said  the  old  man.  "  I  's  willin'  to  wait  on  you 
gemmen,  'cause  you  is  gemmen  ;  but  ef  yer  was  no  count  folks,  I  'd  go  for  yer. 
Ride  in,  Colonel." 

When  we  were  some  distance  from  shore,  the  planter  said : 

"That  old  man  made  way  for  us  simply  out  of  deference  to  our  social 
position.  The  negroes  are  courteous  enough  to  us ;  it  has  been  their  habit  so 
long  that  they  cannot  forget  it.  But  they  will  kill  our  deer  and  steal  our  poultry 
and  bacon,  and  we  have  no  redress." 

After  an  hour  or  two  of  journeying  over  rough  roads,  we  came  to  one  of  the 
plantations.  A  host  of  negroes  were  busily  filling  a  breach  in  a  dyke  which  the 
treacherous  water  might  sweep  away  if  rains  came  to  swell  the  already  ominous 
floods  of  the  Mississippi.  A  pack  of  hounds  came  yelping  to  meet  the  planter ; 
and  the  black  women  in  the  cabin  courtesied  obsequiously. 

We  crossed  the  field,  bordered  by  noble  cypresses  and  oaks,  stopping 
now  and  then  to  watch  the  negroes  as  they  carefully  prepared  the  ground 
which  an  inundation  might,  in  less  than  a  day,  reduce  to  a  hopeless  wilderness 


298  THE     OVERSEER — COTTON -PLANTING. 

of  mud.  Entering  the  house  of  the  overseer,  we  found  that  functionary  smoking 
his  pipe  and  reposing  after  a  long  ride  over  the  plantation.  He  was  a  rough, 
hearty,  good-natured  man,  accustomed  to  living  alone  and  faring  rudely.  I 
asked  him  what  he  thought  of  the  negro  as  a  free  laborer. 

"  He  works  well,  mostly,  sir.  These  yer  Alabama  niggers  that 's  workin'  on 
our  plantations  now  do  well  on  wages.  They  make  some  little  improvements 
around  their  cabins,  but  mighty  little,  sir.  Ef  politics  would  only  let  'em  alone, 
they  'd  get  along  well  enough,  I  reckon." 

"  Do  the  negroes  on  this  plantation  vote?" 

"  I  reckon  not  (laughing).  I  don't  want  my  niggers  to  have  anything  to  do 
with  politics.  They  can't  vote  as  long  as  they  stay  with  us,  and  these  Alabama 
boys  don't  take  no  interest  in  the  elections  here." 

"  What  do  they  receive  as  monthly  wages?" 
"From  ten  to  sixteen  dollars.    It  costs  us  about  fifteen  dollars  per  head  to  bring 
'em  from  Alabama.     These  niggers  likes  wages  better  than  shares.     We  keep  a 
store  here,  and,  Saturday  nights,  most  of  the  money  they  have  earned  comes 
back  to  us  in  trade.      They  're  fond  o'  whiskey  and  good  things  to  eat." 

"  What  is  the  routine  of  your  work  on  a  large  plantation  like  this,  and  those 
adjoining  it,  throughout  the  year  ?  " 

"  Wal,  sir,  I  reckon  that's  a  long  story.  We  don't  have  much  spare  time, 
and  mighty  little  amusement.  Wal,  sir,  the  first  thing  we  do,  sir,  we  begin  early 
in  January,  a  few  weeks  after  the  old  crop  is  all  gathered  in,  to  repair  fences  and 
clean  out  all  the  ditches,  sir.  Then  we  pull  down  the  old  stalks,  and  start  the 
ploughs  to  throw  quadruple  furrows  in  the  fields.  Then  we  throw  out  the 
'  middles.'  " 

"What  are  they?" 

"  Wal,  sir,  we  throw  out  soil  at  the  sides  so  as  to  leave  a  slope  bed  of  fresh 
ground  to  plant  on,  and  loose  earth  to  cover  it  with.  If  the  spring  freshet 
breaks  on  to  this  yer  prepared  earth,  we  've  got  to  begin  over  again,  and  that 
makes  the  season  very  late. 

"  Planting  begins  about  the  last  of  March,  or  very  early  in  April.  Piles  of 
cotton  seed  are  laid  along  some  ways  apart  on  the  field,  and  then  the  niggers 
sow.  it  along  the  beds,  a  ton  of  seed  to  eight  acres.  Then  it  is  '  barred  off' — 
covered  up,  that  means. 

"  Ez  soon  as  the  cotton  stalks  begin  to  peep  up,  'scraping'  begins.  The 
hands  weed  every  row  carefully,  and  don't  leave  any  weakly  plants.  That,  and 
looking  after  the  caterpillars,  keeps  'em  busy  till  July.  Caterpillars  ain't  the  only 
danger  we  have  to  fight  against.  Thar  's  a  hundred  others.  Cotton  's  a  ticklish 
plant  to  raise.  You  've  got  to  watch  it  mighty  close,  and  then  the  worms  and 
the  weather  will  sometimes  ruin  the  crop. 

"  Between  July  and  September  we  keep  the  hands  busy,  getting  out  baskets, 
and  setting  things  in  order ;  then  we  pile  in  new  help,  and  for  the  rest  of 
the  season,  employ  three  times  as  many  hands  as  thar  's  in  the  fields  now. 
Up  to  Christmas  it  's  picking  and  ginning,  and  it  's  right  lively,  you  can  be 
sure." 


COTTON      PLANTATION      NEGROES.  299 

From  the  overseer's  conversation  I  learned  that  cotton-picking  is  done  quite 
as  thoroughly  under  the  system  of  free  labor  as  in  the  days  when  slave-driving 
was  permissible;  but  that  the  "niggers  "  require  constant  watching.  On  many 
plantations  where  the  yield  is  abundant,  it  is  difficult  to  concentrate  labor  enough 
at  the  proper  time  to  get  the  cotton  into  the  gin-house  the  same  year  that  it  is 
planted.  I  have  seen  cotton-fields  still  white  with  their  creamy  fleeces  late  in 
December,  because  the  negroes  were  either  too  lazy  or  too  busily  engaged  in 
.their  annual  merry-makings  to  gather  the  harvest.  But  on  the  large  lowland 
plantations  along  the  Mississippi,  the  crop  is  usually  gathered  early,  and  the 
picking  is  very  thorough.  I  could  not  discover  that  there  was  any  system  of 
"forced  labor"  now  in  use,  and  I  thought  the  overseer's  statement,  that  a  "good 
field-hand  now-a-days  would  pick  250  pounds  of  cotton  daily,"  was  excellent 
testimony  in  favor  of  free  labor.  He  added,  however,  that  on  many  plantations 
the  average  hands  would  not  pick  more  than  100  pounds  per  day. 

The  laborers  were  coming  in  from  the  field  in  a  long  picturesque  procession. 
As  it  was  spring-time  many  of  them  had  been  ploughing,  and  were  mounted 
upon  the  backs  of  the  stout  mules  which  had  been  their  companions  all  day. 
Some  of  the  men  were  singing  rude  songs,  others  were  shouting  boisterously  and 
Scuffling  as  they  went  their  way  along  the  broad  pathway  bordered  by  giant 
cypresses  and  noble  oaks.  The  boys  tumbling  and  wriggling  in  the  grass  per- 
petually exploded  into  guffaws  of  contagious  laughter.  Many  of  the  men  were 
tall  and  finely  formed.  They  had  an  intelligent  look,  and  were  evidently  not 
so  degraded  as  those  born  on  the  Louisiana  lowlands.  The  overseer  sat  on  the 
veranda  of  his  house,  now  and  then  calling  out  a  sharp  command  or  a  caution, 
the  negroes  looking  up  obsequiously  and  touching  their  hats  as  they  heard  his 
voice.  When  the  mules  were  stabled  the  men  came  lounging  back  to  the  cabins, 
where  the  women  were  preparing  their  homely  supper,  and  an  hour  afterward 
we  heard  the  tinkle  of  banjos,  the  pattering  of  feet  and  uproarious  laughter. 
The  interiors  of  the  negro  cabins  were  of  the  rudest  description.  The  wretched 
huts  in  which  the  workmen  live  seem  to  them  quite  comfortable,  however.  I 
saw  no  one  who  appeared  discontented  with  his  surroundings.  Few  of  these 
laborers  could  read  at  all.  Even  those  who  had  some  knowledge  of  the  alphabet 
did  not  seem  to  be  improving  it. 

Late  in  the  evening,  as  the  planter,  with  his  heavy  cloak  thrown  about  his 
shoulders,  was  reposing  from  the  fatigues  of  a  wearisome  ride  over  the  broad 
acres,  a  delegation  of  field-hands  came  to  see  him,  all  to  ask  favors  of  "  de 
Cunnel," — to  get  him  to  write  a  few  letters,  or  to  bring  some  tiny  parcel  from 
the  town  on  his  next  visit  to  the  plantation.  The  men  came  huddling  in,  bowing 
awkwardly,  and  stood  with  their  caps  in  their  hands  as  near  the  door  as  possible, 
as  if  ready  to  run  on  the  slightest  provocation.  If  I  looked  at  them  steadily 
they  burst  into  uneasy  laughter  and  moved  away,  while  the  black  women  in  the 
door-way  and  on  the  porch  re-echoed  the  merriment.  Meantime  the  planter 
listened  to  one  after  another  of  the  delegation.  Charles,  a  black  boy,  six  feet 
tall,  and  with  sinews  strong  as  steel,  stepped  forward  to  the  flickering  light  given 
by  the  candles  and  the  burning  logs  in  the  fire-place. 


300  "THE       LIKELIEST      NEGRO." 

"  Cunnel,  I  wish  you  read  me  dat  letter,  please,  sah." 

The  "  Cunnel "  read  it,  Charles  meantime  standing  erect,  with  his  great  arms 
folded  across  his  mighty  chest  and  the  massive  column  of  his  throat  throbbing 
with  scornful  emotion.  There  was  a  strange,  baffled  expression  in  his  face ;  a 
look  of  contempt  for  his  own  helplessness  which  was  painful. 

The  letter  was  common- place  enough,  reproaching  Charles  for  having  left 
Alabama  before  liquidating  the  pressing  claims  of  certain  swarthy  creditors. 
Having,  after  some  trouble,  deciphered  the  letter's  meaning,  the  Colonel  said, 
gently  but  coldly : 

"  Stand  aside,  Charles.  Andy,  who  is  the  likeliest  negro  from  Alabama  now 
on  the  plantation?" 

No  answer  for  a  minute.  Andy  stepped  forward  into  the  light,  looking  first 
into  the  fire-place,  then  at  the  deer's  horns  over  the  mantel,  then  at  the  shining 
revolver  on  the  rough  wooden  table,  while  his  immense  lips  worked  nervously,  as 
if  endeavoring  to  draw  in  inspiration  from  the  air. 

"  Did  you  hear  me,  Andy?" 

"  Cunnel,  I'sa  studyin',  sah." 

After  having  studied  some  time,  Andy  darted  out  without  a  word,  and 
presently  returned  with  three  hulking  black  giants,  who  huddled  together  in  the 
same  helpless  way  that  the  first  arrivals  did.  They  held  their  shapeless  felt  hats 
in  their  enormous  hands,  glancing  from  them  into  the  faces  of  the  white  men ; 
then  exchanging  significant  looks  with  each  other,  burst  into  the  regulation 
laugh. 

"  Did  the  colored  politicians  try  to  keep  you  from  leaving  Alabama  to  come 
here  with  me,  boys?"  inquired  the  Colonel.  • 

Intense  surprise  on  the  part  of  the  negroes. 

"  No,  sah  ;  reckon  not,  sah." 

"Did  you  vote  in  Alabama?" 

"Yas,  Cunnel;  yas,  sah, always  voted,  sah." 

"  Can  you  do  better  here  than  in  Alabama?" 

After  mature  reflection,  the  trio  responded  in  the  affirmative. 

"Would  you  care  to  vote  here?" 

Hesitatingly,  "No,  sah;"  whereupon  the  three  negroes  were  dismissed  into 
the  darkness. 

The  Alabama  papers  at  the  beginning  of  the  current  year  reported  that  the 
colored  laborers  were  leaving  that  State  in  troops  of  thousands.  They  were  nearly 
all  en  route  for  the  cotton  plantations  of  Mississippi,  and  on  the  Louisiana  bank 
of  the  Father  of  Waters.  Central  Alabama  appeared  at  that  time  to  be  under- 
going rapid  depopulation  for  the  benefit  of  the  richer  lands  along  the  Mississippi 
bottom.  It  was  estimated  in  the  spring  of  1874  that  Alabama  had  already 
lost  from  $700,000  to  $1,000,000  in  her  labor  element  alone.  How  long  the 
influx  of  the  freedmen  into  Mississippi  and  Louisiana  from  the  South  Atlantic 
States  and  from  Alabama  will  continue  is  uncertain.  In  1873  Georgia  lost  fully 
20,000  of  her  able-bodied  colored  laborers,  and  gained  but  little  in  white  immi- 
gration to  balance  it. 


WAGES  —  FOOD — ROUTINE.  3<DI 

The  women  and  children  on  the  cotton  plantations  near  the  Mississippi  river 
do  not  work  in  the  fields  as  much  as  they  used.  Rude  as  are  their  surroundings 
in  the  little  cabins  which  they  now  call  their  own,  they  are  beginning  to  take  an 
interest  in  their  homes,  and  the  children  spend  some  time  each  year  at  school. 
The  laborers  on  the  plantations  in  Louisiana  have  sometimes  been  paid  as  high 
as  thirty  dollars  per  month,  and  furnished  with  a  cabin,  food,  and  a  plot  of 
ground  for  a  garden ;  but  this  is  exceptional. 

While  supper  was  being  prepared  the  master  of  the  plantation  apologized  for 
what  he  modestly  called  the  homely  fare  which,  he  said,  was  all  that  he  could  set 
before  us. 

"We  are  so  far  from  town  here,"  he  said,  "that  we  can  offer  you  only  plan- 
tation fare — rough  meat  and  eggs,  with  bacon,  a  loaf  of  baker's  bread,  and 
some  bottles  of  claret  which  I  brought  from  Vidalia." 

I  ventured  to  suggest  that  on  the  plantation  he  had  every  facility  for  a 
superb  garden,  and  to  wonder  that  the  overseers  did  not  employ  some  of  the 
negroes  to  cultivate  a  plot  of  ground  that  its  fruits  might  appear  on  the  table. 

"Oh,  oh,"  laughed  the  overseer.  "Make  a  garden  here;  reckon  it  would 
have  to  have  a  mighty  high  wall ;  the  niggers  would  steal  everything  in  it  as 
fast  as  it  was  ripe." 

But  I  suggested  that  if  each  of  the  negroes  had  a  small  garden,  which  he 
seemed  to  have  ample  time  after  hours  to  cultivate,  he  would  not  desire  to  steal. 

The  Colonel  smiled  gravely,  and  the  overseer  shook  his  head  incredulously, 
adding : 

"These  is  good  niggers,  but  stealing  is  as  natural  as  eating  to  them;"  and, 
with  this  remark,  we  were  ushered  into  the  supper- room,  where  two  black  servant 
girls  ran  nimbly  about,  bringing  in  plain  but  substantial  fare,  which  our  hard 
riding  made  thoroughly  palatable. 

There  was  no  white  lady  on  the  plantation.  The  overseer  and  his  two  assist- 
ants were  busy  from  dawn  till  dark,  and  when  night  threw  its  shadows  over  the 
great  cypress-bordered  aisles  of  the  forest  and  the  wide  expanse  of  the  fields, 
they  dismissed  the  negroes  about  the  store  and  the  stables  and  retired  to  rest. 
But  on  the  occasion  of  our  visit  we  saw  unusual  activity.  A  violent  storm  arose 
while  we  were  at  supper,  and  the  overseers  mounted  their  horses  and  rode  off 
in  different  directions  to  inspect  the  levees.  Troops  of  negroes  were  dispatched 
in  skiffs  along  the  lake  with  hundreds  of  sacks,  which  they  were  instructed  to 
fill  with  sand  and  place  at  weak  points  on  the  levees.  All  night  they  fought 
the  slowly  but  steadily-rising  waters,  while  my  companion  and  I  slept  on  a  mat- 
tress on  the  floor  of  the  overseer's  room,  undisturbed  by  anything  save  the  sighing 
of  the  winds  through  the  noble  trees  surrounding  the  house,  and  the  clatter  of 
rain  upon  the  shingles. 

With  early  morning  back  came  the  Colonel,  pale  and  worn  with  a  night  of 
battle  with  the  steadily- rising  water,  and,  as  he  laid  aside  his  heavy  cloak,  placed 
his  revolver  on  the  table,  and  sat  down  with  a  weary  sigh,  he  said  it  was  hardly 
worth  while  to  try  to  be  a  successful  cotton-planter  now-a-days ;  things  human 
and  things  divine  seemed  to   conspire  to    make  it   impossible  to  succeed.      I 


302 


A      RAINY      DAY      ON      THE      PLANTATION, 


thought  of  his  sigh  and  of  his  helpless  look  a  day  or  two  afterward,  when  I  was 
told  that  one  thousand  acres  of  his  plantation  had  been  flooded  and  badly  injured 
by  the  offensive  policy  of  a  neighbor  planter,  who  had  cut  the  Colonel's  levees 
to  save  his  own. 

With  daylight  also,  although  the  rain  was  steadily  falling,  the  plantation 
blossomed  into  activity.  The  overseers  had  arisen  long  before  the  dim  streaks 
of  the  dawn  were  seen  on  the  lowland  horizon ;  had  galloped  over  many  a 
broad  acre,  but  returned  gloomily,  announcing  that  the  land  was  too  wet  to  work 
that  day.  The  negroes  slouchingly  disposed  themselves  about  the  store  and  the 
overseer's  "  mansion,"  keeping  at  a  respectful  distance  from  the  kitchen,  where 
sat  the  overseer  himself,  surrounded  by  his  dogs.  Nothing  more  dispiriting 
could  be  imagined  than  the  atmosphere  of  this  lowland  plantation  over  which 
imminent  disaster  seemed  breaking.  From  right  and  left  came  stories  of  trouble 
and  affliction.      Here  and  there  a  planter  had  made  a  good  crop  and  had  laid 


''-^•'--/! 


A  Cotton  Wagon -Train. 


aside  a  little  money,  but  the  evidences  of  material  prosperity  were  painfully 
few.  The  overseers,  while  doggedly  persistent  in  working  the  plantations  up 
to  their  full  capacity,  still  seemed  to  have  a  grim  sense  of  a  fate  which  over- 
hung the  whole  locality,  and  which  would  not  permit  consecutive  years  of  pros- 
perity and  plenty. 

There  is  still  much  on  one  of  these  remote  and  isolated  plantations  to  recall 
the  romance  which  surrounded  them  during  the  days  of  slavery.  The  tall  and 
stalwart  women,  with  their  luxuriant  wool  carefully  wrapped  in  gayly-colored 
handkerchiefs;  the  picturesque  and  tattered  children,  who  have  not  the  slightest 
particle  of  education,  and  who  have  not  been  reached  even  since  the  era  of  re- 
construction, by  the  influences  of  schools  and  teachers;  the  groups  of  venerable 
darkeys,  with  their  gray  slouch  hats  and  impossible  garments,  who  chatter  for 
hours  together  on  the  sunny  side  of  some  out-buildings,  and  the  merry-makings 
at  night,  all  recall  a  period  which,  the  planter  will  tell  you,  with  a  mournful  look, 
comprised  the  halcyon  days  of  Louisiana. 


CHARACTER      OF      THE      NEGROES.  3O3 

The  thing  which  struck  me  as  most  astonishing  here,  in  the  cotton-lands,  as  on 
the  rice  plantations  of  South  Carolina,  was  the  absolute  subjection  of  the  negro. 
Those  with  whom  I  talked  would  not  directly  express  any  idea.  They  gave 
a  shuffling  and  grimacing  assent  to  whatever  was  suggested ;  or,  if  they  dis- 
sented, would  beg  to  be  excused  from  differing  verbally,  and  seemed  to  be  much 
distressed  at  being  required  to  express  their  opinions  openly.  Of  course,  having 
the  most  absolute  political  liberty,  because  in  that  section  they  were  so  largely 
in  the  majority,  numerically,  that  no  intimidation  could  have  been  practiced,  it 
seemed  astonishing  that  they  should  be  willing  to  forego  the  right  to  vote, 
and  to  Avillingly  isolate  themselves  from  their  fellows.  I  could  not  discover 
that  any  of  the  negroes  were  making  a  definite  progress,  either  manifested  by  a 
subscription  to  some  newspaper  or  by  a  tendency  to  discussion ;  and,  while 
the  planter  gave  me  the  fullest  and  freest  account  of  the  social  status  of  the 
negroes  employed  by  him,  he  failed  to  mention  any  sign  of  a  definite  and  in- 
tellectual growth.  The  only  really  encouraging  sign  in  their  social  life  was  the 
tendency  to  create  for  themselves  homes,  and  now  and  then  to  cultivate  the  land 
about  them. 

The  rain  continued  to  fall  in  torrents  as  we  rode  across  the  island  along  the 
muddy  roads,  under  the  great  arches  of  the  cypress-trees,  on  our  return  to 
Natchez.  Here  and  there  a  few  negroes  were  desperately  striving  afield, 
endeavoring  to  effect  something  in  spite  of  the  storm ;  but  the  planter  shook 
his  head  gravely,  and  said  that  all  agricultural  operations  "must  now  be  two 
months  later  than  usual.  The  lack  of  concerted  operations  among  the  planters 
against  the  inroads  of  the  floods,  and  the  disastrous  consequences  of  an  incom- 
petent labor  system,  were,  to  his  thinking,  effectual  drawbacks  to  much  material 
progress  for  a  long  time.  In  a  previous  chapter  I  have  shown  how  the  produc- 
tion of  Concordia  parish  has  fallen  off  since  slavery  was  abolished ;  and  he  could 
not  give  any  encouragement  to  my  hope  that  this  wretched  state  of  affairs  would 
soon  be  changed. 

At  last  we  reached  the  arm  of  the  lake  where  we  expected  to  find  our  sable 
ferry-man,  but  the  rain  had  washed  the  waters  into  quite  a  fury,  and  we  could 
see  neither  ferry-man  nor  barge.  Half-an-hour's  hallooing  at  last  brought  the 
old  man  from  his  cabin  on  the  opposite  side,  and  another  half  hour  brought  him, 
dripping  wet,  with  the  gray  wool  of  his  beard  glistening  with  rain-drops,  to  the 
shore  on  which  we  stood.  He  complained  bitterly  of  his  poverty,  yet  I  was 
surprised  to  learn  that  each  time  the  Colonel  visited  his  plantation  he  paid  this 
venerable  boatman  a  dollar  for  his  ride  across  the  lake.  Although  I  diligently 
endeavored  to  enter  into  conversation  with  the  aged  black  man,  he  steadily 
avoided  any  reference  to  political  topics,  and  assumed  a  look  of  blank  amaze- 
ment when  I  appealed  to  him  for  a  direct  opinion.  But  he  was  always  civil, 
courteous  to  a  degree  not  discoverable  among  people  in  his  rank  of  life  in  the 
North.  His  character  swayed  and  bent  before  any  aggression,  but  did  not 
break ;  it  was  as  stubborn  as  elastic. 

In  the  forest  through  which  ran  the  road  leading  to  the  Colonel's  plantation, 
we  met  a  brown  man  mounted  on  a  stout  horse,  and  loaded  down  with  a 
20 


304 


A     POACHER LOCAL      RIVER      PACKETS. 


small  armory  of  fire-arms,   in  addition  to  which  he  carried  a  long  knife  and  a 
hatchet,  evidently  intended  for  dissecting  some  deer. 

"  Ha  !"  said  the  Colonel  pleasantly,  yet  with  a  touch  of  annoyance  in  his  voice, 

"  30  you  are  going  poaching  on  my  land  again  ?    There  will  soon  be  no  deer  left." 

"Yas,  Cunnel,"  said  the  fellow,  impudently  shifting  his  long  rifle  from  his 

right  to  his  left  shoulder.      "  I  reckon  ef  I  see  any  deer  I 's  gwine  to  go  for  'em, 

sho  ;"  then,  putting  spurs  to  his  steed,  he  galloped  off. 

There  was  no  redress,  and  the  Colonel  was  compelled  to  submit  anew  to  the 
plundering  of  his  preserves. 

Driving  homeward  with  my  artist  companion,  the  Colonel  having  left  us  to 
return  to  his  fight  with  the  levees,  we  were  struck  with  the  picturesque  clusters 
of  negro  cabins  by  the  wayside.  Nowhere  else  in  the  agricultural  regions  of 
the  South  had  we  perceived  such  a  tendency  to  an  artistic  grouping  of  buildings. 
Along  the  road,  which  was  now  so  covered  with  water  that  we  could  hardly  pick 
our  way,  a  few  uproarious  negroes,  with  whiskey  bottles  protruding  from  their 
pockets,  were  picking  their  dubious  way.  As  we  approached  they  saluted  us, 
touching  their  hats  with  sudden  dignity.  Everywhere  in  this  lowland  region  we 
found  the  negro  courteous  more  from  habit  than  from  desire.  Even  when  he  fell 
into  the  sullen  silence  which  marks  his  supremest  dissent,  he  was  deferential  and 
polite  to  a  degree  which  made  that  silence  all  the  more  exasperating.  I  have 
never  in  my  life  seen  a  more  gracious  and  civil  personage  than  the  weather- 
stained  and  tattered  old  negro  who  stood  on  a  shelving  bank  by  the  lake- side, 
and  carefully  pointed  out  to  us  the  best  spots  in  the  submerged  road,  as  we 
drove    through    the    little    village    of   which    he    was    an    inhabitant. 

ff=.  The  local  river  packets, 

^*£         ¥^=  w»J  which  depend  mainly  upon 

the  commerce  of  the  cotton 
plantations  between  Vicks- 
burg  and  New  Orleans,  are 
the  only  means  which  the 
planters  possess  of  commu- 
nication with  the  outer 
world.  The  arrivals  of  the 
"  Robert  E.  Lee,"  or  of  the 
"  Natchez,"  at  the  planta- 
tion landings,  always  furnish 
picturesque  and  interesting 
scenes.  We  had  occasion 
to  journey  from  Natchez  to 
Vicksburg,  departing  from 
the  former  town  late  at 
night.  The  negro  hackman  who  was  to  transport  us  from  the  upper  town  to 
Natchez-under-the-Hill  for  the  moderate  sum  of  three  dollars,  bade  us  remain 
quietly  in  our  rooms  until  "  de  Lee  whistled."  So,  toward  midnight,  hearing 
the  three  hoarse  yells  from  the  colossal  steam-pipes  of  the  Robert  E.  Lee,  we 


A  Cotton  -  Steamer 


A      STEAMER      CABIN TALKS      WITH      PLANTERS.  305 

were  hurried  down  to  the  great  wharf-boat,  where  we  found  a  motley  crowd  of 
negro  men  and  women,  of  sickly,  ague-stricken,  poor  whites,  and  smartly-dressed 
planters,  whose  immaculate  linen  and  rich  garments  betrayed  but  little  of  the 
poverty  and  anxiety  now  afflicting  the  whole  section. 

Presently,  out  of  the  gloom  which  shrouded  the  great  river,  a  giant  shape 
seemed  slowly  approaching,  and  while  we  were  endeavoring  to  discover  what  it 
might  be,  flaring  pine  torches  sent  forth  an  intense  light  which  disclosed  the  great 
packet,  with  her  forward  deck  crowded  with  negro  roustabouts,  whose  faces  shone 
as  the  flame  was  reflected  upon  them.  The  tall  pipes  sent  out  sparks  and  smoke, 
and  the  river-monster,  which  seemed  stealthily  drawing  near  to  us  to  devour  us, 
winked  its  fiery  eyes  and  sleepily  drew  up  at  the  wharf,  where,  with  infinite 
trouble,  it  was  made  fast  with  many  stout  ropes,  while  the  mates  screamed  and 
cursed  as  only  Mississippi  boatmen  can. 

The  cabin  of  one  of  these  steamers  presents  quite  a  different  aspect  from 
those  of  the  Northern  packets  which  come  from  St.  Louis  and  Cincinnati.  The 
bar  is  a  conspicuous  object  as  one  enters,  and  around  it  cluster  eager  groups 
busily  discussing  the  latest  phase  of  the  Kellogg  usurpation,  or,  in  such  times  of 
depression  and  disaster  as  during  my  visit,  lamenting  their  fate  with  a  philosophic 
air  doubtless  somewhat  enhanced  by  the  soothing  nature  of  the  liquids  imbibed. 

As  the  traveler  goes  to  register  his  name  and  purchase  his  ticket,  the  obliging 
clerk  hands  him  the  latest  file  of  the  New  Orleans  papers,  of  which  hundreds  of 
copies  are  given  away  at  all  the  ports  where  the  packets  stop.  No  planter  along 
the  line  thinks  of  buying  a  newspaper,  but  depends  on  the  clerk  of  the  steamer, 
who  willingly  furnishes  him  the  news  of  the  day. 

About  the  card-tables  men  are  busily  absorbed  in  the  intricacies  of  "  poker" 
and  "seven-up,"  and  the  talk  is  of  cotton  and  of  corn,  of  the  rise  and  fall  of  the 
river,  and  reminiscences  of  adventures  in  forest  and  on  stream  during  the  "  waw." 
On  the  "  Robert  E.  Lee  "  I  found  a  number  of  prominent  young  cotton-planters, 
all  of  whom  were  complaining  of  the  effects  of  the  inundation.  Many  of  these 
planters  were  educated  gentlemen,  familiar  with  life  at  the  North,  and  with  the 
best  society.  None  of  them  were  especially  bitter  or  partisan  in  their  views ; 
their  material  interests  seemed  to  command  their  immediate  attention,  and  they, 
as  others  throughout  the  cotton  country  of  the  South,  complained  of  the  seem- 
ing impossibility  of  reorganizing  labor  upon  a  fair  and  proper  basis.  All  were 
unanimous  in  their  testimony  as  to  the  superiority  of  free  over  slave  labor,  but 
all  asserted  that  it  was  attended  with  so  many  drawbacks  and  vexations  that  they 
feared  it  would  end  in  the  promotion  of  much  distress,  and  in  the  ruin  of  hundreds 
of  planters.  They,  however,  were  by  no  means  confronted  with  the  worst 
aspects  of  the  labor  question,  since  labor  was  flowing  to  them,  and  not  receding 
from  them,  as  from  the  planters  in  Central  Alabama,  and  in  certain  portions  of 
Mississippi. 

Mr.  Robert  Somers,  in  his  excellent  observations  on  the  labor  question,  as 
viewed  in  Alabama,  made  during  a  journey  throughout  the  Southern  States  in 
1870-71,  hits  upon  some  truths  with  regard  to  the  relations  of  the,  planter  and 
freedman,  in  the  following  manner : 


306  THE      SHARE      SYSTEM.       . 

"  What  the  planters  are  disposed  to  complain  of  *is,  that  while  they  have  lost 
their  slaves,  they  have  not  got  free  laborers  in  any  sense  common  either  in  the 
Northern  States  or  in  Europe.  One  cannot  but  think  that  the  New  England 
manufacturer  and  the  Old  England  farmer  must  be  equally  astonished  at  a 
recital  of  the  relations  of  land,  capital  and  labor,  as  they  exist  on  the  cotton 
plantations  of  the  Southern  States.  The  wages  of  the  negroes,  if  such  a  term 
can  be  applied  to  a  mode  of  remuneration  so  unusual  and  anomalous,  consist, 
as  I  have  often  indicated,  of  one-half  the  crop  of  corn  and  cotton,  the  only  crops 
in  reality  produced. 

"The  negro  on  the  semi-communistic  basis  thus  established  finds  his  own 
rations ;  but,  as  these  are  supplied  to  him  by  the  planter  or  the  planter's  notes 
of  credit  on  the  merchants,  and  as  much  more  sometimes  as  he  thinks  he 
needs  by  the  merchants  on  his  own  credit,  from  the  ist  of  January  onward 
throughout  the  year,  in  anticipation  of  crops  which  are  not  marketable  until 
the  end  of  December,  he  can  lose  nothing  by  the  failures  or  deficient  out- 
come of  the  crops,  and  is  always  sure  of  his  subsistence.  As  a  permanent 
economic  relation,  this  would  be  startling  anywhere  betwixt  any  classes  of  men 
brought  together  in  the  business  of  life.  Applied  to  agriculture,  in  any  other 
part  of  the  world,  it  would  be  deemed  outrageously  absurd,  but  this  is  only  a 
part  of  the  '  privileges '  (a  much  more  accurate  term  than  '  wages ')  of  the  negro 
field-hand.  In  addition  to  half  the  crops,  he  has  a  free  cottage  of  the  kind  he 
seems  to  like,  and  the  windows  of  which  he  or  his  wife  persistently  nail  up ;  he 
has  abundance  of  wood  from  the  planter's  estate  for  fuel,  and  for  building  his 
corn-cribs  and  other  out-houses,  with  teams  to  draw  it  from  the  forest.  He  is 
allowed  to  keep  hogs  and  milch  cows  and  young  cattle,  which  roam  and  feed 
•with  the  same  right  of  pasture  as  the  hogs  and  cattle  of  the  planter,  free  of  all 
charge.  Though  entitled  to  one-half  the  crops,  he  is  not  required  to  contribute 
any  portion  of  the  seed,  nor  is  he  called  upon  to  pay  any  part  of  the  taxes  on 
the  plantation.  The  only  direct  tax  on  the  negroes  is  a  poll  tax."  Mr.  Somers 
declares  that  he  found  this  tax  "everywhere  in  arrear,  and,  in  some  places,  in  a 
helpless  chaos  of  non-payment.  Yet,"  he  adds,  "  while  thus  freed  from  the 
burden  of  taxation,  the  negro  has,  up  to  this  period  of  reconstruction,  enjoyed 
the  monopoly  of  representation,  and  has  had  all  legislative  and  executive  power 
moulded  to  his  will  by  Governors,  Senators  and  Deputies,  who  have  been  either 
his  tools,  or  of  whom  he  himself  has  been  the  dupe.  For  five  years,"  he  con- 
cludes, "  the  negroes  have  been  kings,  lords  and  commoners,  and  something 
more,  in  the  Southern  States." 

"But  to  come  back,"  continues  Mr.  Somers,  "to  the  economic  condition  of 
the  plantations,  the  negro  field-hand,  with  his  right  of  half- crop  and  privileges  as 
described,  who  works  with  ordinary  diligence,  looking  only  to  his  own  pocket, 
and  gets  his  crops  forward  and  gathered  in  due  time,  is  at  liberty  to  go  to  other 
plantations  and  pick  cotton,  in  doing  which  he  may  make  from  two  to  two  and  a- 
half  dollars  a  day.  For  every  piece  of  work  outside  the  crop  that  he  does  even 
on  his  own  plantation,  he  must  be  paid  a  dollar  a  day.  While  the  land  owner  is 
busy  keeping  account  betwixt  himself  and  his  negro  hands,  ginning  their  cotton 


OBSERVATIONS   ON   PLANTATION   LABOR. 


307 


for  them,  doing  all  the  marketing  of  produce  and  supplies,  of  which  they  have 
the  lion's  share,  and  has  hardly  a  day  he  can  call  his  own,  the  hands  may  be 
earning  a  dollar  a  day  from  him  for  work  which  is  quite  as  much  theirs  as  his. 
Yet  the  negroes,  with  all  their  superabounding  privilege  on  the  cotton-field, 
make  little  of  it.  A  ploughman  or  a  herd  in  the  Old  World  would  not  exchange 
his  lot  for  theirs,  as  it  stands  and  as  it  appears  in  all  external  circumstances." 

I  have  quoted  these  excellent  remarks,  as  they  afford  a  glimpse  into  some  of 
the  causes  of  the  discouragement  which  prevails  among  large  numbers  of  cotton- 
planters. 

Nothing  can  be  more  beautiful  than  the  appearance  of  a  cotton-field,  extend- 
ing over  many  hundreds  of  acres,  when    the  snowy  globes  of  wool  are  ready  for 


Scene  on  a  Cotton  Plantation. 


picking,  and  the  swart  laborers,  with  sacks  suspended  from  their  shoulders, 
wander  between  the  rows  of  plants,  culling  the  fleeces.  The  cotton-plant  is 
beautiful  from  the  moment  when  the  minute  leaflets  appear  above  the  moist  earth 
until  the  time  when  it  is  gathered  in.  In  June,  when  it  is  in  bloom  and  when 
the  blossoms  change  their  color  day  by  day,  a  cotton  plantation  looks  like  an 
immense  flower  garden.  In  the  morning  the  blooms  of  upland  cotton  are  often 
of  a  pale  straw  color ;  at  noon  of  a  pure  white ;  in  the  afternoon  perhaps 
faint  pink,  and  the  next  morning  perfect  pink.  It  is  noticed,  however,  that  the 
blossom  of  the  sea-island  cotton  always  remains  a  pale  yellow.  When  the  flow- 
ers fall  away,  and  the  young  bolls  begin  to  grow,  the  careful  negroes  watch  for 
the  insidious  approach  of  the  cotton-worms,  terrible  enemies  to  plantation 
prosperity.      There  are  many  kinds  of  these  worms  ;   they  multiply  with  astonish- 


308  THE     GROWING     COTTON THE     COTTON-WORM. 

ing  rapidity,  and  sometimes  cut  off  the  entire  crop  of  whole  districts.  Their 
presence  cannot  be  accounted  for,  although  elaborate  investigations  into  the  cause 
of  their  appearance  have  been  undertaken  ever  since  1800,  when  they  first 
appeared  in  the  South.  There  is  a  popular  belief  that  they  come  at  intervals  of 
three  years  in  the  same  districts,  and  that  their  greatest  ravages  occur  after  inter- 
vals of  twenty-one  years.  Their  appetites  are  exclusively  confined  to  cotton,  of 
which  they  devour  both  the  long  and  the  short  staples  greedily. 

The  planters  build  fires  in  the  fields  when  they  perceive  that  the  insects  are 
about  to  visit  their  crops,  hoping  to  attract  and  destroy  the  moths  which  are  the 
parents  of  the  worms ;  but  in  many  cases  this  proves  insufficient.  When  the 
cotton- worm  appears  early  in  the  season  there  are  usually  three  broods.  If  the 
fires  are  built  exactly  at  the  time  of  the  appearance  of  the  first  moths,  then  their 
speedy  destruction,  preventing  the  appearance  of  the  second  and  third  broods, 
aids  in  limiting  the  ravages;  but  the  remedies  are  rarely  undertaken  in  time. 
The  ally  of  this  vicious  destroyer  of  the  planter's  fondest  hopes  is  the  boll- worm 
moth,  a  tawny  creature  who  in  the  summer  and  autumn  evenings  hovers  over 
the  cotton-blooms  and  deposits  a  single  egg  in  each  flower.  In  three  or  four  days 
this  egg  is  hatched,  and  out  of  it  comes  a  worm  who  voraciously  eats  his  way 
into  the  centre  of  the  boll,  and  then,  ere  it  falls  to  the  ground,  seeks  another,  in 
which  he  in  like  manner  buries  himself.  In  Central  Alabama,  in  1873,  we 
were  told  that  plantations  were  so  devastated  by  worms  that  they  seemed 
as  if  lightning  had  passed  over  them  and  scathed  them.  The  bolls  were,  in 
many  cases,  cut  down  for  entire  acres  as  completely  as  if  the  reaper's  sickle 
had  been  thrust  into  them. 

During  picking  season  in  the  States  of  North  and  South  Carolina,  Georgia, 
Northern  Florida,  Louisiana,  Alabama,  and  Mississippi,  the  southern  half  of 
Arkansas  and  the  eastern  half  of  Texas,  plantation  life  is  busy  and  merry.  If 
the  planter  has  made  a  good  crop,  he  calls  in  multitudes  of  negroes  from  the 
surrounding  country  to  help  him  pick.  These  laborers  sometimes  wander  from 
plantation  to  plantation,  like  the  hop-pickers  in  the  West;  but  where  labor  is  .not 
scarce,  an  extra  force  for  a  few  days  is  all  that  is  required. 

By  the  middle  of  October  the  season  is  at  its  height.  Each  person  is 
expected  to  pick  two  or  three  hundred  pounds  of  cotton  daily,  and  as  fast  as  the 
fleeces  are  picked  they  are  carried  either  in  wagons  or  in  baskets,  on  the  heads 
of  negroes,  to  the  gin-house.  There,  if  the  cotton  is  c'amp,  it  is  dried  in  the 
sun,  and  then  the  fibre  is  separated  from  the  seed,  to  which  it  ,is  quite  firmly 
attached. 

Nothing  can  be  simpler  or  more  effective  than  the  machinery  of  the  ordinary 
Whitney  cotton-gin.  Its  main  cylinder,  upon  which  is  set  a  series  of  circular 
saws,  is  brought  into  contact  with  a  mass  of  cotton  separated  from  the  cylinder 
by  steel  bars  or  gratings.  The  teeth  of  the  saws,  playing  between  these  bars, 
catch  the  cotton  and  draw  it  through,  leaving  the  seeds  behind.  Underneath  the 
saws  a  set  of  stiff  brushes,  revolving  on  another  cylinder  moving  in  an  opposite 
direction,  brushes  off  from  the  saw-teeth  the  lint  which  was  taken  from  the  seed, 
and  a  revolving  fan,  producing  a  rapid  current  of  air,  throws  the  light  lint  to  a 


•'ginning"    cotton 


309 


convenient  distance  from  the  gin.  The  ginning"  of  sea-island  cotton  is  practiced  in 
South  Carolina  and  Georgia,  and  requires  the  use  of  two  fluted  rollers,  commonly 
made  of  wood,  but  sometimes  of  vulcanized  rubber  or  steel,  placed  parallel  in  a 
frame  which  keeps  them  almost  in  contact.  These  rollers  revolve  in  opposite 
directions,  and  draw  the  cotton  between  them,  while  the  seeds,  owing  to  the  lack 
of  space,  do  not  pass  through. 

Horse  power  is  ordinarily  used  on  small  plantations  in  ginning  cotton,  while 
the  great  planters  employ  steam.  But  now  a  host  of  enterprising  individuals 
have  set  up  gin-houses  in  neighborhoods  central  to  many  plantations,  and  to 
them  flock  the  many  whites  and  blacks  who  cultivate  one  or  two  acres  in  cotton. 
The  gins  in  these  houses  are  usually  run  by  steam,  and  many  a  man  has  made  a 
small  fortune  in  two  or  three  years  since  the  war  by  preparing  the  cotton  brought 
to  him  from  the  country  round  about.      Fires  are  frequent  in  these  gin-houses. 


Baton  Rouge,  Louisiana. 

and  sometimes  the  freedmen  revenge  themselves  upon  their  ex-masters  by  send- 
ing their  expensive  machinery  heavenward  in  a  blaze.  Such  malice  as  this, 
however,  is  not  common,  although  there  are  some  instances  of  planters  who  have 
lost  many  thousands  of  dollars  by  the  torch  of  the  incendiary. 

After  the  cotton  leaves  the  gin  it  passes  to  the  press,  where  it  is  packed  into 
bales.  On  small  plantations  these  presses  are  worked  by  hand  or  by  horse 
power,  while  on  the  great  and  finer  ones  hydraulic  presses  are  common.  On 
well-ordered  lands  the  picking  is,  of  course,  over  before  Christmas,  and  the 
planters  and  laborers  alike  give  themselves  up  to  the  jollity  of  holidays;  but,  as 
I  have  already  mentioned,  the  sight  of  acres  of  unpicked  cotton  in  January  and 
February  m  some  parts  of  the  South  is  not  at  all  uncommon.  It  is  the  most 
effectual  proof  of  the  complete  disorganization  of  the  labor  system. 

One  of  the  peculiar  vexations  which  the  planter  suffers  is  the  constant  steal- 
ing of  cotton  by  the  negroes  during  picking  time.  They  manage  to  abstract  it 
in  petty  quantities ;   and  after  having  accumulated  a  little  stock,  they  take  it,  if 


3io 


THE      RED      RIVER      RAFT 


they  live  in  the  vicinity  of  a  city,  to  what  is  known  as  a  "dead  fall  house,"  where 
a  clever  "  fence,"  or  receiver  of  stolen  goods,  buys  unquestioningly  whatever 
they  bring.  If  they  live  in  some  remote  section,  they  boldly  carry  the  cotton 
to  the  local  merchant,  who  receives  it  in  barter,  very  likely  before  the  eyes  of 
the  planter  from  whom  it  was  stolen,  and  who  knows  that  he  has  no  practical 
redress.  Most  of  the  negroes  on  the  plantations  have  not  the  strong  sense  of 
honor  which  should  lead  them  to  consider  their  employers'  interests,  as  their  own, 
and  many  of  the  merchants  encourage  them  in  their  thievish  propensities. 

Sixty-five  miles  below  Natchez  the  Red  river  empties  into  the  Mississippi. 
The  recent  improvements  made  by  the  General   Government   upon  this  river, 


The  Red  River  Raft  as  it  Was. 

under  the  direction  of  the  Board  of  Engineers,  in  the  removal  of  the  raft  of 
drift-wood,  have  given  it  new  commercial  possibilities.  The  raft,  which  was 
thirty  miles  long,  had,  for  many  years,  rendered  navigation  north  of  Shreveport 
impossible.  The  sketch,  which  the  kindness  of  one  of  the  engineers  who  had 
been  employed  in  the  removal  of  obstructions  placed  at  the  disposal  of  our 
artist,  will  serve  to  show  what  the  Red  river  raft  was.  The  river  runs  through 
one  of  the  finest  cotton  regions  in  the  country,  and,  in  its  ample  and  fertile 
valley,  immense  quantities  of  cotton  and  sugar,  grain  and  tobacco  will,  in  future, 
be  produced.  Not  only  Louisiana,  but  Arkansas  and  Texas,  have  been  directly 
benefited  by  the  improvement  of  the  stream. 


XXXII. 

MISSISSIPPI — ITS     TOWNS — FINANCES SCHOOLS. 

PLANTATION     DIFFICULTIES. 

MISSISSIPPI  and  Alabama  together  form  a  mighty  domain ;  many  an  empire 
has  been  founded  upon  a  less  extent  of  territory  than  either  contains. 
Both  States  have  suffered  a  good  deal  from  evils  incident  to  reconstruction ;  both, 
I  believe,  are  destined  to  a  recuperation  soon  to  come,  and  to  a  wealth  and  posi- 
tion such  as  neither,  in  the  palmy  days  of  slavery,  dreamed  of.  Alabama,  with 
her  million  of  inhabitants,  and  Mississippi,  with  her  nine  hundred  thousand,  seem, 
to  an  European  or  Northern  Visitor,  almost  uninhabited.  In  each  State  there  is 
still  an  immense  tract  of  native  forest.  The  railway  lines,  almost  as  numerous  in 
Mississippi  as  in  Alabama,  run  for  scores  of  miles  through  woods  and  uncleared 
or  unreclaimed  lands.  The  slave-holders  naturally  sought  out  the  best  land  to 
mass  their  negroes  upon,  and  now  the  freedmen  are  settled  there,  rudely  try- 
ing to  work  out  the  problem  of  self-government,  a  problem  extremely  difficult 
for  the  wisest  community  to  solve,  and,  of  course,  utterly  beyond  the  scope  of  a 
horde  of  newly  emancipated  negroes.  There  has  been  a  marvelous  widening 
and  heightening  of  sentiment  in  each  State,  and  something  of  national  feeling  is 
now  manifested  in  both.  A  little  money  and  consequent  independence  would 
enable  the  capable  people  to  do  a  great 'deal,  despite  the  encumbrance  of  the 
incapables.  Mississippi  has  no  minerals  from  which  to  predict  a  future  growth ; 
but  her  splendid  soil  grows  cotton  superbly,  and  Indian  corn,  tobacco,  hemp, 
flax,  silk,  as  well  as  all  kinds  of  grains  and  grasses.  At  one  end  of  the  State 
the  apple  flourishes ;  at  the  other,  one  may  luxuriate  in  orange  groves  and  under 
the  shade  of  the  fig-tree.  The  sixty  counties  in  Mississippi  contain  farms  and 
plantations  whose  cash  value,  in  1870,  was  nearly  $100,000,000.  The  rivers  run 
south-west,  to  pay  tribute  to  the  mighty  stream  from  which  the  State  takes  its 
name — save  a  few  in  the  eastern  section,  which  flow  into  the  Alabama  rivers, 
and  thence  reach  the  Gulf  of  Mexico.  Property  has  fallen  ruinously  in  both 
Alabama  and  Mississippi;  the  former  boasted,  in  i860,  a  valuation  in  real  estate 
and  personal  property,  of  nearly  $450,000,000;  in  1870,  $155,000,000.  Missis-, 
sippi,  at  the  outbreak  of  the  war,  had  a  valuation  of  $509,472,912  ;  and  in  1870, 
$154,535,527.  The  cotton  production  of  Mississippi  fell  from  1,202,507  bales  in 
i860,  to  564,938  bales  in  1870;  and  the  wealthy  planter  vanished  before  the 
storm  of  revolution. 

Corinth,  in  Mississippi,  with  its  memories  of  terrible  battles,  is  at  the  junction 
of  the  Memphis  and  Charleston  railroad  with  the  Mobile  and  Ohio.  There 
Beauregard  once  sat  haughtily  entrenched  until  Halleck's  persistence  in  assault 


Compiled  from  9th.Census. 


Russell  &  Struthers.N.Y. 


MAP    SHOWING    THE    COTTON    REGION    OF    THE    UNITED    STATES. 


312  CORINTH — MERIDIAN. 

drove  him  away ;  and  there  occurred  that  ghastly  encounter  between  Rosecrans 
and  Van  Dorn,  which  looms  up,  like  a  hideous  vision,  through  the  battle-smoke 
of  our  recent  history.  The  land  was  as  thoroughly  camped  upon  as  any  in 
Virginia,  and  to-day  the  tracks  of  the  contending  armies  are  still  visible,  in  the 
devastated  timber  and  waste  lands.  There  is  good  soil  thereabouts.  Located 
on  so  important  a  line  as  the  Memphis  and  Charleston,  Corinth  is  gradually 
gaining,  and  a  few  thousand  bales  of  cotton  annually  go  to  market  from  its 
vicinity.  A  cotton  and  woolen  manufacturing  company,  an  extensive  enterprise, 
with  large  capital,  has  been  started  near  by.  Pushing  down  the  Mobile  and 
Ohio  railroad  to  Meridian,  past  renaissant  Okalona,  which  received  such  a  terrible 
shattering  during  the  war;  past  tiny  towns  and  villages  where  cotton  bales,  small 
wooden  houses,  and  the  depot,  are  the  principal  features ;  along  the  rich  prairie 
lands,  world-famous ;  over  the  pine  slopes — one  comes  upon  the  rich  wood- 
lands which  fringe  the  country  in  which  Meridian  stands.  From  Okalona  a 
branch  line  runs  off  to  the  new  and  thriving  town  of  Aberdeen  ;  from  both 
towns  and  their  neighborhood  large  quantities  of  cotton  are  annually  sent 
to  market. 

Meridian,  Mississippi,  a  new  town  in  the  woods,  yet  pretty  withal,  is  the 
southern  terminus  of  the  Alabama  and  Chattanooga  railroad,  which  runs  through ' 
Birmingham,  in  Alabama,  to  Chattanooga,  in  Eastern  Tennessee.  At  the  time 
of  my  journey  along  the  line  from  Birmingham  northward,  the  road  was  in 
the  anomalous  condition  into  which  Southern  railways  sometimes  get;  a  condition 
in  which  no  one  knows,  or  scarcely  considers  it  worth  while  to  inquire,  who 
owns,  it,  so  hopeless  is  the  embarrassment.  No  tickets  were  to  be  had  at  the 
depot ;  I  was  informed  that  it  was  uncertain  whether  there  would  be  any 
train  that  night.  "Reckoned  the  conductor  ('captain,'  my  informant  called 
him)  was  running  the  train,  and  making  what  he  could  of  it."  But  the  line 
is  a  remarkably  fine  one,  and  as  soon  as  population  comes  in  to  support  it, 
will  be  one  of  the  great  routes  of  the  South.  It  passes,  on  its  way  north- 
ward, through  Eutaw,  Alabama,  pretty  in  its  bowers  of  shade  trees;  along  the 
fertile  prairies,  with  their  underlayers  of  limestone;  and  crosses  the  Tombigbee 
river  at  a  point  where  the  whitish  limestone  bluffs  are  ranged  in  rows,  form- 
ing high  banks,  as  picturesque  and  imposing  as  the  walls  of  an  ancient  temple. 
Here  pnce  was  great  wealth,  and  here  toiled  thousands  of  slaves.  Now  they  have 
vanished ;  so  has  the  wealth,  and  the  planter  is  left  behind  to  worry  along  as 
best  he  can.  Tuscaloosa,  named  after  a  valiant  Indian  chief  of  Alabama's  early 
history,  was  for  many  years  the  capital  of  the  State,  and  is  the  site  of  the  State 
Lunatic  Asylum,  a  United  States  land  office,  and  many  flourishing  schools. 
The  State  University,  already  alluded  to,  has  a  group  of  handsome  buildings 
on  a  commanding  eminence  not  far  from  the  banks  of  the  Black  Warrior  river. 
Few  students  frequent  it  now,  though  there  is  some  hope  that  it  may  be 
revivified  as  Alabama  grows  prosperous  once  more.  Situated  on  the  borders 
of  both  the  agricultural  and  mineral  region  of  the  State,  Tuscaloosa  has 
always  been  interested  in  the  mining  of  both  the  iron  and  the  coal  abundant 
near  by,  and  the  Kennedale  cotton-mill,  near  the  town,  has  been  in  prosperous 


FRENCH      IMPERIALISTS RAILROAD      CONNECTIONS. 


313 


operation  since  1868.  The  Black  Warrior*  is  a  fine  stream,  and  serves  as  a  high- 
way for  the  transportation  of  coal  and  iron  to  Demopolis,  and  thence  via  the 
Tombigbee  toward  the  Gulf.  Demopolis  was  settled  in  1818  by  a  colony  of 
French  imperialists  whose  devotion  to  Napoleon  the  First  had  compelled  them  to 
fly  from  France.  Among  them  were  many  noted  soldiers  and  ladies  of  the 
fallen  Emperor's  court.  Many  afterward  returned  to  France,  and  but  few  of 
their  descendants  at  present  remain  in  Alabama. 

Scattered  over  the  fifty-five  thousand  square  miles  which  make  up  the  State 
of  Mississippi,  there  are  but  half-a-dozen  towns  of  considerable  size.  It  can 
readily  support  on  its  thirty-five  millions  of  acres  a  dozen  millions  of  people. 
Vicksburg,  Natchez,  Jackson,  and  Columbus  are  the  principal  towns ;  the  rest  are 
villages,  into  which  the  trade  created  by  the  surrounding  country  has  crowded. 


The  Mississippi  State  Capitol  at  Jackson. 

All  the  good  lands  are  very  accessible  ;  railroads  run  in  every  direction  through 
the  State.  The  Vicksburg  and  Meridian  route  runs  from  Meridian  through  Jack- 
son to  the  Mississippi  river ;  the  New  Orleans,  Jackson  and  Great  Northern  gives 
the  capital  easy  communication  with  New  Orleans  and  via  the  Mississippi 
Central,  which  runs  from  Jackson  to  Grenada,  and  from  Grenada  through  Holly 
Springs  and  Oxford  to  the  Tennessee  line,  sends  a  current  of  Northern  trade  and 
travel  through  the  State.  Columbus,  Mississippi,  is  an  enterprising  town  on  the 
Tombigbee  river,  in  the  centre  of  a  rich  planting  region,  and  depends  mainly  for 
its  support  upon  the  shipment  of  cotton  to  Mobile.  Vicksburg  and  Natchez 
have    already  been  described  in  their  relations  to  the  Mississippi  river  and  the 

*  Tusca-loosee  —  meaning  Black  Warrior — was    the  Choctaw   term  for    the  river,  and  the 
town  took  its  name  from  it. 


3*4 


THE      MISSISSIPPI      CAPITOL PUBLIC      BUILDINGS. 


country  which  contributes  to  their  trade ;  it  remains,  therefore,  to  give  some  idea 
of  Jackson,  the  capital  of  Mississippi. 

First  of  all,  Jackson  is  very  pretty — a  quiet,  unambitious  village  of  five  or  six 
thousand  inhabitants,  on  the  banks  of  the  Pearl  river,  a  charming  stream,  which 
makes  its  erratic  way  through  lovely  forests  and  thickets,  and  whose  current  is 
strewn  with  the  drift-wood  torn  from  them.  At  Jackson  one  begins  to  feel  the  ripe- 
ness and  perfection  of  the  far  South;  he  is  only  twelve  hours  from  New  Orleans, 
and  sees  in  the  gardens  the  same  lustrous  magnificence  .  of  blossom  which  so 
charmed  his  eye  in  the  Louisiana  metropolis.  The  evenings  are  wonderfully 
beautiful,  silent,  impressive.  Reaching  Jackson  from  Vicksburg  at  dark,  I  strolled 
along  the  half-mile  of  street  between  the  hotel  and.  the  business  centre  of  the 
town;  there  was  no  stir — no  sound;  one  might  as  well  have  been  in  a  wood. 
At  last,  encountering  a  mule-car,  whose  only  occupant  was  the  negro  driver,  I 
returned  in  it  to  the  hotel,  where  I  found  that  every  one  but  the  watchful 
clerk  had  retired. 

The  State  Capitol,  a  solid  and  not  unhandsome  building,  the  Penitentiary, 
the  Insane  Asylum,  the  Land  Office,  a  fine  Governor's  residence,  and  the 
Asylum  for  the  Deaf  and  Dumb  and  Blind,  compose  Jackson's  public  buildings, 
all  well  built  and  commodious.  At  the  proper  seasons,  one  sees  in  the  long  main 
street  of  the  town,  lines  of  emigrant  wagons,  filled  with  hard-featured  men  and 
women  bound  for  Texas  or  "Arkansaw."  These  Ishmaels  are  not  looked  upon 
with  any  especial  love  by  the  inhabitants  who  intend  to  remain  in  their  native 
State,  and  are  often  the  subjects  of  much  satire,  which  they  bear  good-humoredly. 
Hebrew  names  appeared  to  predominate  on  the  signs;  the  Jews  monopolize  most 
of  the  trade;  negroes  lounge  everywhere,  and  there  are  large  numbers  of  smartly 


"At  the  proper  seasons,  one  sees  in  the  long  main  street  of  the  town,  lines  of  emigrant  wagons." 

dressed  mulattoes,  or  sometimes  full  blacks,  who  flit  here  and  there  with  that  con- 
scious air  which  distinguishes  the  freedman.  I  wish  here  to  avow,  however,  that 
those    of  the   negroes   in   office,   with  whom   I  came  in  contact   in    Mississippi,, 


NEGRO    OFFICIALS GOVERNOR     AMES.  315 

impressed  me  much  more  powerfully  as  worthy,  intelligent,  and  likely  to  progress, 
than  many  whom  I  saw  elsewhere  in  the  South.  There  are  some  who  are 
exceedingly  capable,  and  none  of  those  immediately  attached  to  the  Government 
at  Jackson  are  incapable.  In  the  Legislature  there  are  now  and  then  negroes 
who  are  ignorant ;  but  of  late  both  branches  have  been  freer  from  this  curse  than 
have  those  of  Louisiana  or  South  Carolina. 

A  visit  to  the  Capitol  showed  me  that  the  negroes,  who  form  considerably 
more  than  half  the  population  of  Mississippi,  had  certainly  secured  a  fair  share  of 
the  offices.  Colored  men  act  as  officials  or  assistants  in  the  offices  of  the 
Auditor,  the  Secretary  of  State,  the  Public  Library,  the  Commissioner  of  Emi- 
gration, and  the  Superintendent  of  Public  Instruction.  The  Secretary  of  State, 
who  has  some  negro  blood  in  his  veins,  is  the  natural  son  of  a  well-known  Mis- 
sissippian  of  the  old  regime,  formerly  engaged  in  the  politics  of  his  State ;  and 
the  Speaker  of  the  House  of  Representatives  at  the  last  session  was  a  black  man. 
The  blacks  who  went  and  came  from  the  Governor's  office  seemed  very  intelligent, 
and  some  of  them  entered  into  general  conversation  in  an  interesting  manner. 

The  present  Governor,  ex- United  States  Senator  Adelbert  Ames,  was  four 
years  Military  Governor  of  Mississippi,  and  knows  the  temper  of  both  whites  and 
blacks  in  the  State  very  well.  To  his  military  regime  succeeded  the  Government 
of  Mr.  Alcorn,  now  United  States  Senator  from  Mississippi,  and  when  Mr.  Alcorn 
was  sent  to  the  Senate,  Lieutenant-Governor  Powers  took  his  place.  Alcorn, 
returning  from  the  Senate  last  year,  contested  the  Governor's  chair  with  Ames, 
but,  not  succeeding  in  a  re-election,  returned  to  Washington.  At  the  outset 
of  Governor  Ames'  civil  administration,  which  began  recently,  he  affirmed  his 
determination  to  redeem  the  Republican  party  in  that  section  from  the  charge  of 
corruption,  and  the  Legislature  has  taken  measures  to  second  his  laudable  resolve. 

Mississippi's  State  debt  is  but  little — some  three  millions  ;  she  was  fortunate 
enough  not  to  have  any  credit  in  the  markets  of  the  world  when  reconstruction 
began,  and  therefore  escaped  a  good  many  financial  dangers.  Her  repudiation 
of  her  honest  indebtedness,  years  ago,  did  her  infinite  harm,  and  it  would  be 
wise  to  take  up  that  debt,  and  pay  it  in  future.  Part  of  the  money  at  present 
owed  by  the  State  is  due  the  schools.  The  State  tax  is  not  large  ;  it  is  the  city 
and  county  taxation  which  is  oppressive,  but  that  is  mainly  because  of  the 
straitened   circumstances  of  the  people. 

The  vicious  system  of  issuing  State  warrants  has  been  for  some  time  pursued, 
but  a  bill  was  passed  at  the  last  legislative  session,  funding  all  these  warrants ; 
which  had  the  effect  of  bringing  them  up  at  once  from  sixty  to  eighty  cents.  A 
new  law  also  requires  that  all  taxes  be  paid  in  greenbacks.  The  State  paper  has, 
at  times  since  reconstruction,  been  sold  on  the  street  in  Jackson  at  forty  per  cent, 
below  par.  The  return  to  a  cash  basis  will,  it  is  estimated,  save  twenty-five  per 
cent,  in  the  cost  of  government  alone.  A  general  movement  in  favor  of 
"retrenchment  and  reform"  on  the  part  of  the  dominant  party  is  manifest,  the 
natural  result  of  which  will  be  the  restoration  of  the  State's  credit.  Governor 
Ames  is  firm  in  his  measures,  and  is  not  surrounded,  to  judge  from  a  brief  look 
at  them,  with  men  who  are  inclined  to  misuse  their  opportunities. 


316  PROGRESS     OF      EDUCATION NEWSPAPERS. 

The  State  Superintendent  of  Education  informed  me  that  there  are  about 
75,000  children  now  in  attendance  upon  the  State  schools,  fully  50,000  of  whom 
are  colored.  He  believed  that  there  was  at  the  time  of  my  visit  $1,000,000 
worth  of  school  property  owned  in  the  State,  which  proved  a  great  advance  since 
the  war.  In  "counties  mainly  Democratic  in  sentiment,  there  is  formidable  oppo- 
sition to  anything  like  a  public  school  system,  but  in  those  where  Republican  or 
negro  officials  dominate,  schools  are  readily  kept  open  and  fully  attended.  The 
Superintendent  said  that  he  had  in  only  one  case  endeavored  to  insist  upon 
mixed  schools,  and  that  was  in  a  county  where  the  white  teachers  had  refused 
to  teach  negro  scholars.  He  had  found  it  necessary  to  inform  those  teachers 
that,  in  that  case,  they  must  not  attempt  to  keep  the  black  children  from  the 
white    schools,  since   he   was   determined  that  they   should   receive    instruction. 

The  school  fund  is  quite  large ;  there  are  normal  schools  at  Holly  Springs 
and  Tougaloo;  and  the  blacks  have  founded  a  university  named  after  Ex- Gov- 
ernor and  Senator  Alcorn.  It  occupies  the  site  of  the  old  Oakland  College  near 
Rodney,  on  the  Mississippi  river,  and  receives  an  annual  appropriation  of 
$50,000. 

A  successful  university  has  also  been  in  operation  in  Tougaloo  for  several 
years.  First-class  teachers  for  the  public  schools  are  very  much  needed.  Large 
numbers  of  very  good  private  schools  are  maintained  in  the  State  by  those 
citizens  who  still  disbelieve  in  free  public  tuition. 

The  University  of  Mississippi,*  at  Oxford,  an  old  and  well  managed  institu- 
tion, exclusively  patronized  by  whites,  receives,  as  does  Alcorn  University,  an 
annual  subsidy  of  $50,000  from  the  State,  and  its  average  attendance  is  fully 
equal  to  that  before  the  war.  It  has  been  properly  fostered  and  nourished 
by  the  Republican  Government,  and  the  motley  adventurers  in  South  Carolina 
might  learn  a  lesson  in  justice  and  impartiality  from  the  party  in  power  in 
Mississippi. 

As  soon  as  the  funds  devoted  by  the  State  to  educational  purposes  are  paid 
in  greenbacks,  or,  in  other  words,  when  the  evil  system  of  "warrants"  is 
thoroughly  extinct,  Mississippi  will  make  sterling  progress  in  education,  and,  in 
proportion,  will  grow  in  thrift,  wealth  and  importance. 

Jackson  has  two  flourishing  newspapers,  The  Pilot  being  the  Republican,  and 
The  Clarion  the  Democratic  organ.  Socially,  the  town  has  always  been  one  of 
high  rank  in  the  South,  although  some  of  the  rougher  Mississippian  element  has 
at  times  been  manifest  in  that  section.  The  residence  once  occupied  by  Mr. 
Yerger,  who  killed  the  military  Mayor  of  Jackson,  shortly  after  the  close  of  the 
war,  because  that  Mayor  had  insisted  upon  the  collection  of  certain  taxes,  is  still 
pointed  out  to  visitors.  There  are  many  charming  drives  in  the  town ;  a  little 
beyond  it,  the  roads  are  rough  and  the  country  is  wild.  A  garrison  is  main- 
tained at  Jackson,  and  now  and  then  the  intervention  of  United  States  authority 
is  necessary  to  quell  disturbances  in  interior  districts. 

The  State  has  made  efforts  to  secure  immigration,  but,  like  many  other 
Southern  commonwealths,  finds  it  impossible  to  compete  with  the  North-west, 
*  Both  this  and  Alcorn  University  have  agricultural  departments. 


SOURCES      OF     WEALTH COMMERCIAL     FACILITIES.  317 

and  becomes  discouraged  in  presence  of  the  objections  made  by  white  laborers  to 
settling  within  its  boundaries.  The  south-western  portion  presents  really  fine 
inducements  for  the  cultivation  of  cotton,  corn,  tobacco,  sugar-cane,  peaches, 
pears,  apples,  and  grapes.  In  several  of  these  south-western  counties  the  yield  of 
sugar  has  been  one  thousand  pounds  to  the  acre.  The  average  yield  of  cotton  is 
a  bale  to  the  acre.  Fruit  culture  could  be  made  a  paying  specialty  throughout 
that  part  of  the  State. 

The  rich  stores  of  pine,  pecan,  hickory,  oak,  walnut,  elm,  ash,  and  cypress 
timber  form  also  an  element  of  future  wealth.  Those  lands  fronting  upon  the 
Gulf  of  Mexico  offer,  in  orange  orchards  and  the  miraculous  oyster-beds  along 
the  shores,  rare  prizes  for  the  emigrants  who  will  go  and  take  them.  The  counties 
a  little  remote  from  the  coast  are  rich  in  a  luxuriant  growth  of  pine,  and  there 
too,  the  culture  of  sugar  and  the  grape  has  already  been  successful. 

The  stock- grazier,  also,  can  find  his  paradise  there;  and  there  the  ample 
water  power  of  the  Pearl,  the  Wolf,  the  Pascagoula,  the  Escalaufa,  the  Leaf  and 
the  Chickasawha  rivers  can  turn  the  largest  mills.  •  The  average  price  of  lands 
in  the  State,  accepting  the  testimony  of  the  Government  immigration  agent,  is 
five  dollars  per  acre. 

Life  and  property  are  probably  as  safe  at  present  as  in  any  other  State 
in  the  South.  The  reputation  of  Southern  Mississippi  has  not  heretofore 
been  of  the  best  in  respect  to  law  and  order;  but  the  State  seems  to  be 
now  entering  upon  an  epoch  of  peace  and  confirmed  decency.  Mississippi  has, 
undoubtedly,  suffered  immensely,  in  a  material  point  of  view,  since  the  close 
of  the  war,  but  is  now  on  the  road  to  an  upbuilding,  and  would  spring  into 
astonishing  growth  if  the  vexed  labor  question  could  only  be  settled  in  some 
manner. 

An  immigration  to  the  Mississippi  sea-board,  where  there  is  so  much  magnifi- 
cent timber,  would  be  peculiarly  advantageous  to  young  men  possessed  of  small 
capital.  Pascagoula  river  and  its  tributaries  give  a  water  line  thirteen  hundred 
miles  in  extent  through  a  dense  timber  region.  Millions  of  feet  of  good  lum- 
ber are  now  shipped  from  this  section.  The  improvement  of  the  harbor  and 
the  deepening  of  the  channel  at  Pascagoula,  and  the  elevation  of  that  place  and 
of  Bay  St.  Louis  into  ports  of  entry,  would  greatly  increase  the  trade  of  Missis- 
sippi in  that  direction. 

The  people  of  the  State  have  also  long  desired  the  connection  of  the  Gulf 
coast  with  the  central  interior,  by  a  railway  line,  and  will  demand  it  soon.  Until 
it  is  accomplished  Mississippi  will,  perforce,  pour  streams  of  commerce  into 
Mobile  and  New  Orleans,  while  her  own  grand  harbors  remain  unimproved  and 
empty.  Meantime,  the  completion  of  the  network  gradually  covering  the  State 
goes  on ;  and  the  Memphis  and  Selma,  the  Mobile  and  North-western,  the 
Vicksburg  and  Memphis,  the  Vicksburg  and  Nashville,  the  Prentice  and  Bogue 
Phalia,  and  the  Natchez,  Jackson  and  Columbus  roads  are  projected,  and,  in 
some  cases,  the  routes  have  been  partially  graded. 

The  Vicksburg  and  Nashville  road  has  no  very  powerful  reason  for  existence, 
as  its  projected   line  is    intersected   at   equidistant   intervals   by  three   rich   and 

21 


3i» 


UNIMPROVED      CONDITION      OF     THE      STATE. 


powerful  lines  in  successful  operation ;  and  there  has  been  a  good  deal  of  opposi- 
tion to  the  surrendering  to  that  road  of  the  trust  funds  known  as  the  three  per 
cents.,  and  the  agricultural  land  scrip,  amounting  in  all  to  some  $320,000. 

Along  the  line  of  rail  from  Jackson  to  New  Orleans  there  is  much  growth  of 
substantial  character.  Mr.  H.  E.  McComb,  of  Wilmington,  Delaware,  has  built  up 
a  flourishing  town  not  far  from  the  Louisiana  line,  and  named  it  McComb  City. 
But  the  country  is  still  mainly  in  a  wild  state,  and  one  cannot  help  feeling,  while 

borne  along  in  the  palace-car  through 
forests  and  tangled  thickets,  that  he  is 
gradually  leaving  the  civilized  world 
behind.  He  imagining  each  village 
which  he  sees,  like  an  island  in  the 
ocean  of  foliage,  to  be  the  last,  and 
experiences  a  profound  astonishment 
when  he  comes  upon  the  cultivated 
and  European  surroundings  of  New 
Orleans.  Northward,  along  the  rail- 
way lines,  it  is  much  the  same. 

All  one  day  we  traversed  the  line 
from  Jackson  to  Memphis,  coming  to 
but  two  towns  of  any  mentionable  size 
in  the  whole  distance.  The  others 
were  merely  groupings  of  a  few  un- 
painted  houses  built  against  the  hill- 
sides, among  the  trees,  and  on  the 
open    plains. 

Plantation  life  is  much  the  same 
in  all  sections  of  the  State,  although 
the  methods  of  culture  and  the  amount 
of  results  may  differ.  The  white  man 
and  the  negro  are  alike  indifferent  to 
a  safe  and  steady  provision  for  the  future  by  growing  their  own  supplies. 

The  planters  are  nearly  all  poor,  and  very  much  in  need  of  ready  money, 
for  which  they  have  to  pay  exorbitant  rates  of  interest.  At  the  end  of  a  year 
of  pretty  hard  work, — for  the  cotton  planter  by  no  means  rests  upon  a  bed  of 
roses, — both  whites  and  blacks  find  themselves  little  better  off  than  when  they 
began,  and  feel  sore  and  discouraged.  The  negroes  migrate  to  Louisiana  and 
Texas  in  search  of  paying  labor,  while  the  planters  complain  very  generally 
of  the  scarcity  of  help. 


"The  negroes  migrate  to  Louisiana  and  Texas  in  search 
of  paying  labor." 


XXXIII. 

MOBILE,      THE      CHIEF      CITY      OF     ALABAMA. 

THERE  was  a  delicious  after-glow  over  sky  and  land  and  water  as  I  left  New 
Orleans  for  Mobile  one  warm  evening  in  March,  the  month  which,  in  the 
South,  is  so  radiant  of  sunshine  and  prodigal  of  flowers. 

Nothing  in  lowland  scenery  could  be  more  picturesque  than  that  afforded  by 
the  ride  from  New  Orleans  to  Mobile,  over  the  Mobile  and  Texas  railroad,  which 
stretches  along  the  Gulf  line  of  Louisiana,  Mississippi  and  Alabama.  It  runs 
through  savannahs  and  brakes,  skirts  the  borders  of  grand  forests,  offers  here  a 
glimpse  of  a  lake  and  there  a  peep  at  the  blue  waters  of  the  noble  Gulf;  now 
clambers  over  miles  of  trestle-work,  as  at  Bay  St.  Louis,  Biloxi  (the  old  fortress 
of  Bienville's  time)  and  Pascagoula ;  and  now  plunges  into  the  very  heart  of 
pine  woods,  where  the  foresters  are  busily  building  little  towns  and  felling  giant 
trees,  and  where  the  revivifying  aroma  of  the  forest  is  mingled  with  the  fresh 
breezes  from  the  sea. 

The  wonderful  charm  of  the  after- glow  grew  and  strengthened  as  the  train 
was  whirled  rapidly  forward.  We  came  to  a  point  from  which  I  saw  the  broad 
expanse  of  water  beneath  the  draw-bridge  over  the  Rigolets,  and  the  white  sails 


On  the  Bay  Road,  near  Mobile,  Alabama.     [Page  321.] 


hovering  far  away,  like  monster  sea-gulls,  on  either  side  the  railroad.  The  illu- 
sion was  almost  perfect;  I  seemed  at  sea.  Along  the  channel  I  could  see  the 
schooners,  and  now  and  then  a  steamer,  coming  from  the  deep  canals  that  run 


320 


ON      THE      ROAD      TO      MOBILE. 


from  New  Orleans  to  Lake  Pontchartrain,  and  communicate  with  Lake  Borgne. 
At  a  little  pine-built  village,  completely  shrouded  in  foliage,  and  seemingly  lulled 
to  sleep  by  the  murmurous  song  of  the  birds  and  drowsy  hum  of  the  insects,  a 
party  of  roystering  negro  men  and  women,  carrying  banjos  and  guitars  on  their 
shoulders,  left  the  forward  car.      Suddenly  my  next  neighbor  said  : 

"  Did  you  see  that  white  man  thar,  'mong  the  niggers,  with  a  beaver  on,  'long 
o'  that  big  black  wench  ?" 

"  Do  you  really  think  he  was  a  white  man  ?  " 

"Yes,  d n  him;  p'r'aps  his  heart's  black,  though.     Looks  like  that  big 

nigger  was  his  wife." 

Then  the  voice  grumbled  itself  away  into  silence. 

This  somewhat  deadened  the  romance  with  which  I  was  beginning  to  invest 
the  journey — for  the  mystical  twilight  creeping  on,  the  strange  panorama  of 
vegetation  flitting  before  my  eyes,  the  sudden  transition  from  forest  to  Gulf  shore, 
and  the  sombre  calm  of  the  horizon  where  blue  wave  seemed  mutely  kissing 
bluer  sky,  all  combined  to  throw  one  into  delightful  musings.  I  retired  to  the 
platform  of  the  Pullman  car,  and  was  once  more  giving  way  to  the  spell  of  the 
sunset,  when  a  sharp  voice  behind  me  said  : 


"Mobile  bay  lay  spread  out  before  me."     [Page  321.] 

"Cap'n,  can't  you  set  inside,  'n  let  us  shet  the  do'?  The  mosquitoes  is  gitting 
so  they  bite  powerful  sharp." 

Then  darkness  came  treacherously  and  suddenly,  as  it  does  in  that  strange 
Southern  land ;  and  we  rolled  rapidly  through  the  edge  of  Mississippi  ;  past 
the  pretty  Gulfside  towns,  whither  beauty  and  fashion  fly  in  spring  and  sum- 
mer ;  past  inlet,  across  river,  and  turned  landward  to  Mobile. 

The  lovely  bay  on  which  the  chief  city  of  Alabama  is  located  extends  thirty 
miles  inland  to  the  mouth  of  the  Alabama  river.  One  of  the  most  charming 
promenades  near  Mobile  lies  on  the  bay  shore.  Bowling  merrily  over  the  shell 
road  one  superb  March  day,  I  was  impressed  with  the  tranquil  beauty  of  the 


THE      ROAD      NEAR      MOBILE      BAY. 


321 


spot.  There  was  a  light  haze ;  Mobile  bay  lay  spread  out  before  me,  a  dimly 
seen  vision,  the  foreground  dotted  with  masses  of  drift-wood  brought  in  by  the 
tide,  and  with  the  long  piers  running  out  to  pretty  bathing-houses. 

There  was  a  strange  and  sleepy  air  of  quiet  about  the  place ;  a  tropical  luxu- 
riance of  sunlight  and  blossom,  so  curiously  at  variance  with  one's  preconceived 
notions  of  March,  that  it  was  a 
perpetual  puzzle  !  A  gentle  breeze 
blew  steadily  inland ;  it  seemed 
perfume-laden.  The  tide  was  com- 
ing in.  Here  and  there  we  had 
glimpses  of  long  beaches  as  fine 
in  their  rounded  sweep  as  Castella- 
mare,  and  massive  magnolias,  sixty 
or  seventy  feet  high,  threw  noble 
shadows  over  the  sheeny  water, 
from  which  the  haze  gradually 
lifted.  Vines,  water  oaks,  and 
pines  tall  enough  for  the  masts 
of  Vikings'  ships,  bordered  the 
way.  Neat  residences  peered  from 
rose-smothered  gardens;  a  negro 
woman  fished  silently  in  a  little 
pool  made  by  the  tide,  never 
catching  any  fish,  and  seemingly 
content  to  regard  the  reflections  of 
her  own  ebony  face  in  the  water ; 
a  swart  farmer  lazily  followed  the 
mule-drawn  plough  afield ;  urchins  tumbled  among  the  snags  and  drift-wood 
hauled  up  to  dry ;  and  goats  and  kids  lingered  and  skipped  distrustfully  on  the 
knolls  by  the  roadside. 

Here  was  a  garden  filled  with  arbors  and  benches  in  cozy  nooks;  in  its  centre, 
a  latticed  cafe,  whose  proprietor  was  opening  soda  bottles,  and,  barearmed,  dis- 
pensing cooling  drinks  to  customers  sprawling  on  seats,  with  their  faces  raised  to 
catch  the  inspiring  breath  of  the  sea.  There  was  no  whir  of  gilded  equipages ; 
the  long  avenue  seemed  all  my  own;  I  could  almost  fancy  that  the  coast  was 
mine,  the  islands  and  the  light-houses  were  mine,  and  that  the  two  negro 
hunters,  loitering  by  with  guns  on  their  shoulders,  were  my  gamekeepers,  come 
to  attend  me  to  the  chase.  The  delicate  hint  of  infinity  on  the  mingled  wave 
and  haze-horizon ;  the  memories  of  siege  and  battle  awakened  by  the  sight  of  the 
dim  line  of  Blakely  coast ;  the  penetrating  perfume  wafted  from  magnolias  and 
pines;  the  soul- clarifying  radiance  of  the  sunshine,  which  industriously  drove 
away  the  light  mist,  all  conspired  to  surround  me  with  an  enchantment  not  dis- 
pelled until  I  had  once  more  gained  the  streets  of  the  town. 

We  are  indebted  to  Bienville,  that  prince  of  colonial  guardians,  for  Mobile,  as 
well  as  for  New  Orleans.      He  it  was  who,  in  171 1,  built  the  defense  called  Fort 


"A  negro  woman  fished  silently  in  a  little  pool." 


122 


MOBILE,    PAST      AND      PRESENT. 


Conde,  on  the  present  site  of  the  town,  and  who  gave  the  name  of  Mobile  to  the 
bay,  because  the  Indians  inhabiting  that  section  called  themselves  Mobilians. 
On  the  west  side  of  the  bay  he  at  one  time  erected  a  fort  called  "  St.  Louis  de  la 
Mobile."  For  half  a  century  the  present  city  was  only  a  frontier  military  post, 
carrying  on  a  small  trade  with  the  Indians.  It  was  French  in  character  and 
sentiment,  and  although  but  few  of  the  Gallic  characteristics  are  now  perceptible 
in  the  manners  of  any  of  its  inhabitants,  there  are  hints  of  the  departed  French 
in  the  architecture  and  arrangement  of  the  town.  It  fell  into  British  hands  in 
1763,  by  the  treaty  of  Paris  between  Great  Britain  and  France,  and  was  too 
remote  from  the  other  colonies  to  succeed  in  doing  anything  against  British  rule 
during  the  American  Revolution. 

After  the  British  came  the  Spaniards,  who  drove  out  the  former,  and  partially 
burned  Mobile  during  the  siege.  In  due  time,  as  tract  after  tract  was  wrested 
from  the  Indians,  the  territory  of  Mississippi  was  formed,  with  Winthrop  Sargent 
of  Massachusetts  as  Governor,  and  to  this  Government  Mobile  and  its  tributary 
country  were  accountable,  after  the  departure  of  the  Spaniards,  until  the 
thorough  subjugation  of  the  savage,  and  his  expulsion  from  the  Tennessee  valley, 
and  from  his  hunting  grounds  on  the  Chattahoochee,  had  opened  the  whole 
domain  to  the  white  man,  and  a  portion  of  Mississippi  territory  was  organized  in 
March  of  1817,  under  the  name  of  "Alabama."  By  1819,  white  settlers  had 
flocked  into  the  country  in  such  numbers  that  Alabama  was  admitted  to  the 
Union. 

Mobile  is  to-day  a  pretty  town  of  35,000  inhabitants,  tranquil  and  free  from 
commercial  bustle,  for  it  has  not  been  as  prosperous  as  many  of  its  southern  sea- 
port sisters.      Government  street,  its  principal  residence  avenue,  has  many  fine 

mansions  situated  upon  it;  the  gar- 
dens are  luxuriant,  and  give  evidence 
of  a  highly  cultivated  taste.  Superb 
oak-trees  shade  that  noble  street,  as 
well  as  the  public  square  between  Dau- 
phin and  St.  Francis  streets.  The 
streets  and  shops  are  large,  and  many 
are  elegant ;  but  there  is  no  activity ; 
the  town  is  as  still  as  one  of  those 
ancient  fishing  villages  on  the  Massa- 
chusetts coast  when  the  fishermen  are 
away.  Yet  there  is  a  large  movement 
of  cotton  through  Mobile  yearly.  A 
cotton  exchange  has  grown  up  there 
within  the  last  two  years,  and  when  I 
visited  it,  already  had  100  members. 
The  Custom -House— Mobile,  Alabama.  Mobile  annually  receives  and  dispatches 

from  325,000  to  350,000  bales  of  cotton,  most  of  which  comes  from  Mississippi, 
much  of  whose  carrying  trade  she  controls.  Some  of  the '  cotton  brought  to 
Mobile  goes    eastward,  but  the  mass  of  it  goes  to  the  foreign  shipping  in  the 


THE      HARBOR      OF      MOBILE  —  THE      CITY   S      COTTON     TRADE. 


323 


"lower  bay."  The  port  needs  many  improvements,  and  the  Government  has 
for  some  time  been  engaged  in  a  kind  of  desultory  dredging  out  there,  but 
has  not  yet  succeeded  in  affording  a  sufficient  depth  of  water  to  allow  large 
vessels  to  come  directly  to  the  wharves ;  and  the  lines  of  artificial  obstruction, 
built  across  the  channel  of  the  bay  during  the  war,  to  impede  the  passage  of 
vessels,  have  not  yet  been  removed. 

In  due  time,  with  a  revival  of  commerce  and  the  development  of  the  immense 
resources  in  cotton,  coal  and  iron  in  the  State,  the  channel  through  the  bay  will 
be  properly  deepened,  and  Mobile  will  have  a  wharf  line  along  its  whole  front. 
At  present,  however,  it  seems  that  foreign  captains  rather  prefer  to  have  their 
ships  loaded  from  small  crafts  which  come  twenty  or  twenty-five  miles  down  the 
bay  with  the  cotton,  as  they  thus  avoid  port  dues  and  the  danger  of  desertion  of 
sailors.  It  costs  but  twenty  cents  per  bale  to  convey  the  cotton  down  the 
harbor,  and  the  captains,  anxious  to 
get  their  lading  and  depart,  have 
none  of  the  customary  port  delays 
and  exactions  to  complain  of.  In 
1867-68,  Mobile  exported  358,745 
bales;  in  1868-69,  but  247,348;  in 
1869-70,  sent  away  298,523;  in 
1870-71,  the  number  rose  to  417,508; 
but  in  1871-72,  fell  again  to  295,629; 
and  in  1872-73  was  over  300,000. 
Of  this  cotton  the  greater  portion  was 
sent  directly  to  Liverpool,  the  amount 
going  northward  yearly  varying  from 
80,000  to  160,000  bales.  Down  the 
Alabama  river,  from  the  rich  but 
lately  unfortunate  country  around 
Montgomery  and  Selma,  come  thou- 
sands of  bales  on  the  light-draft 
steamers ;  and  the  river  banks  form  one  continuous  line  of  cotton  plantations. 
Nearly  400  vessels,  employing  7,500  sailors,  and  having  a  tonnage  of  275,000 
tons,  are  annually  employed  in  direct  commerce  with  the  port.  This  cotton 
movement  does  not,  however,  make  Mobile  either  especially  rich  or  active 
as  a  town,  inasmuch  as,  aside  from  a  few  manufactories  of  minor  importance,  it 
constitutes  the  sole  business. 

The  railroad  connections  of  the  city  are  excellent,  and  her  citizens  are  anxious 
to  improve  them  still  farther.  The  New  Orleans,  Mobile  and  Texas  line  gives 
direct  communication  with  New  Orleans  and  Brashear  City,  the  point  of  depart- 
ure of  the  Morgan  steamships  for  Texas  ;  the  Mobile  and  Ohio  road  connects 
Mobile  with  Columbus  in  Mississippi ;  the  Mobile  and  Montgomery  gives  it  a 
highway  to  the  State  capital,  and  thence  via  the  South  and  North  Alabama  road 
through  the  wonderful  mineral  region,  to  Decatur  and  Nashville.  It  is  intended 
io  create  a  road  from   Mobile  to  Tallahassee  in  Florida,  in  due  time,  and  the  city 


Bank  of  Mobile  and  Odd  Fellows*  Hall  —  Mobile,  Alabama. 


324 


PENSACOLA POSSIBLE      ANNEXATION. 


The  Marine  and  City  Hospitals — Mobile,  Alabama. 


already  has  connection  with  Pensacola,  the  most  important  of  the  northern. 
Florida  ports.  All  that  section  of  the  "  land  of  flowers  "  contiguous  to  Alabama 
Avill  doubtless  be  annexed  sooner  or  later ;  there  is  a  growing  sentiment  in  both 

States  in  favor  of  annexation.  The  pres- 
ent route  to  Pensacola  from  Mobile  is 
roundabout ;  one  has  to  make  a  trian- 
gular detour  from  Mobile  to  Pollard, 
on  the  Montgomery  road,  and  thence 
return  coastward  on  the  Pensacola  and 
Louisville  route.  At  present  the  only 
connection  which  Pensacola  has  with 
Eastern  Florida  is  via  steamers  to  St. 
Mark's,  and  thence  by  rail  across  the 
peninsula  to  Jacksonville.  Pensacola 
has  one  of  the  most  remarkable  harbor,s 
in  the  world;  it  is  thirty  miles  long, 
from  six  to  eight  wide,  and  nearly 
thirty- five  feet  deep.  The  average 
depth  on  the  bar  at  the  harbor  entrance 
is  twenty-four  feet.  Any  ship,  however  heavily  loaded,  can  readily  approach 
Pensacola  at  any  season  of  the  year,  and  can  reach  the  open  sea  in  a  couple  of 
hours.  The  harbor  is  safe — differing  in  that  respect  from  many  of  the  Florida 
ports,  and  is  amply  defended  by  three 
forts  in  good  condition.  A  naval  sta- 
tion, and  boasting  a  marine  hospital 
and  a  custom-house,  Pensacola,  with 
its  four  thousand  inhabitants,  already 
talks  grandly  of  its  great  future.  The 
immense  quantities  of  fine  timber 
which  grow  in  lower  Alabama  and 
upper  Florida  furnish  the  city  with 
an  extensive  lumber  trade.  The  com- 
pletion of  the  North  and  South  rail- 
road gives  it  also  almost  an  air  line  to 
Nashville  and  Louisville,  and  promises 
to  make  it  in  future  one  of  the  outlets, 
like  Brunswick  on  the  South  Atlantic 
coast,  for  the  trade  of  the  West* 

The     Mobile     and    Montgomery  -5^* 

road  has  done  much  for  Mobile,  plac-  Trinity  Church -Mobile,  Alabama. 

ing  the  town  upon  one  of  the  main  lines  of  travel  across  the  country.  Two 
excellent  bridges  span  the  Mobile  and  Tensaw  rivers;  the  old  and  tedious  transfer 

*  In  1872,  eight  hundred  foreign  ships  entered  Pensacola  harbor,  and  probably  a  thousand 
come  there  yearly.  Few  come  save  in  ballast,  their  object  being  to  procure  outward  freights  of 
cotton  and  lumber. 


RAILROADS  —  MANUFACTORIES- 


SHIP      CANAL. 


325 


In  the  City  Park,  Mobile — "Ebony  nurse-maids  flirt  with  their  lovers. 


by  boats  is  done  away ;  and  to-day  a  stream  of  freight  and  travel  passes  through 
the  city  from  North  to  South,  bringing  with  it  visitors  and  investors.  The  pro- 
jected "Grand  Trunk"  railroad  has  not  yet  made  much  progress.  It  is  intended 
to  give  an  additional  route  from  Mobile  to  the  mineral  regions,  and  its  completion 
would  develop  a  large 
section  of  valuable  coun- 
try. It  will  stretch  four 
hundred  miles  into  the  in- 
terior, making  new  trade 
for  Mobile,  but  it  is  not 
likely  to  be  built  at  once. 
It  has  been  completed  to 
Jackson,  fifty- nine  miles 
from  Mobile. 

Mobile  does  not  rank 
as  high,  as  a  commercial 
city,  as  in  the  palmy 
days  gone  by ;  but  the 
peculiar  advantages  of 
her  location,  and  the  vast 
resources  of  the  State 
whose  chief  seaport  she 
is,  can  but  bring  her  a  good  future.  At  present  her  banking  capital  is  small, 
hardly  aggregating  a  million  and  three-quarters,  and  outside  rates  for  money  are 
ruinously  high.  There  is  a  large  and  increasing  capital  concentrated  in  fire  and 
life  insurance  companies;  the  manufactories  are  all  of  minor  importance,  except 
the  Creole  and  the  Mobile  cotton-seed  oil  works.  Alabama  produces  nearly 
three  hundred  thousand  tons  of  cotton-seed  annually,  of  which  fully  one-half  can 
be  spared  for  sale.  There  is  a  similar  prosperous  factory  at  Selma.  This  industry 
may  attain  large  proportions.  Mobile  has  made  active  efforts  to  become  one  of 
the  principal  coffee  markets  of  the  Union,  and  claims  that  direct  importation  from 
Rio  to  Mobile  is  easier,  less  expensive,  and  more  direct  than  to  New  Orleans. 
The  retail  trade  of  the  city  has  been  greatly  injured  by  the  establishment  through- 
out the  State  of  a  vast  number  of  new  stores,  where  the  freedmen  on  the  adjacent 
plantations  now  purchase  the  supplies  which  they  once  bought  in  bulk  in 
Mobile.  There  is  some  hope  that  the  city  may  become  the  coaling  station  for 
the  steam  navigation  of  the  Gulf.  The  Cedar  Keys  and  Florida  railroad  is  the 
medium  of  shipping  much  cotton  and  other  produce  directly  to  New  York 
from  Mobile,  which  would  have  been  diverted  elsewhere  were  it  not  for  this 
advantageous  route. 

The  construction  of  the  proposed  ship  canal  across  Florida  would  be  very  bene- 
ficial to  Mobile,  in  affording  her  a  cheap  water-way,  while  the  South  Atlantic  ports 
must  necessarily  be  restricted  in  growth  by  expensive  railroad  transportation. 

My  visit  to  Mobile  was  in  spring-time,  when  the  whole  land  was  covered  with 
blossoms.      The  City  park  is  filled  with  noble  trees,  in  whose  shade  ebony  nurse- 


326 


SPRING      HILL SOUVENIRS      OF      MOBILE      KAY. 


maids  flirt  with  their  lovers  and  squirrels  frolic  with  the  children.      The  drive 
along  the  quiet  and  secluded  by-way  to   "Spring  Hill"   reminded  one    of  the 
rich  bloom  and   greenness  of  England,   save   that  here  and    there  were    semi- 
's- i^M&rflSlK&siB?  -  tropical    blossoms.      Climbing    to 

the  roof  of  the  Jesuit  college  on 
'  Spring  Hill,  I  looked  out  over  a 
lovely  plain,  once  studded  with 
beautiful  homes,  many  of  which 
have  now  fallen  sadly  into  decay. 
A  dense  growth  of  forest  still 
shrouds  much  of  the  surrounding 
country ;  in  the  distance  the  faint 
line  of  the  Gulf  seemed  a  silver 
thread.  Along  the  hills,  over 
which  I  wandered,  flourished  all 
the  trees  peculiar  to  the  far  South, 
and  the  Scuppernong  grape  grew 
magnificently  in  the  college  vine- 
yards. The  fresh  and  aromatic 
atmosphere  of  the  woods,  mingled 

In  the  City  Park,  Mobile-"  Squirrels  frolic  with  the  children."  ^^    ^    ddicate    breath    from    fa 

sea,  made  it  difficult  for  one  to  fancy  that  pestilence  could  ever  spread  its  wings 
above  Mobile.  Yet  there,  as  elsewhere,  from  time  to  time  the  death  angel 
inaugurates  his  terrible  campaign,  and  the  citizens  are  compelled  to  flee  to  the 
mountains. 

Mobile  bay  is  replete  with  historic  interest.  One  may  perhaps  think,  in  look- 
ing out  over  its  placid  waters,  of  Iberville's  colonists  coming,  in  1799,  a  motley 
and  sea-stained  gang,  to  land  on  Dauphin's  Island,  and  finding  there  so  many 
human  bones,  that  they  called  it 
Massacre  Island  ;  but  one  cannot 
forget  the  mighty  naval  battle  when 
grim  old  Commander  Farragut  forced 
his  way  past  the  fire  of  Fort  Morgan 
and  Fort  Gaines,  whose  Confederate 
guns  were  at  all  hazards  to  be  silenced. 
One  cannot  remember,  without  a  thrill, 
how  one  day  the  squadron,  which  had 
hung  steadfastly  at  the  mouth  of  the 
bay  during  three  long  years  of  war, 
transformed  itself  into  a  fiery  antago- 
nist—  a  war- fleet,  breathing  forth  fire 
and  destruction ;  nor  how,  after  the 
admiral  had  fought  his  way  with  his 
fleet  past  the  forts  into  the  harbor,  the 

giant  ram,    the    "Tennessee,"   the   pride  Barton  Academy- Mobile,  Alabama. 


ALABAMA      CELEBRITIES MASKERS PUBLIC      BUILDINGS. 


327 


and  glory  of  the  Alabamians  who  built  her,  stood  out  to  meet  her  formidable 
foes,  although  she  had  seen  the  decks  of  all  her  other  Confederate  consorts 
transformed  into  slaughter-pens.  One  cannot  forget  how,  even  after  the  harbor 
was  taken,  and  closed  against  the  blockade-runners,  the  little  city  held  valiantly 
out  another  twelve  months,  until  the  attack  by  Canby  on  the  defenses  along  the 
eastern  shore  was  crowned  with  victory,  until  the  Spanish  Fort  and  Blakely,  Bat- 
teries Hager  and  Tracy  were  invested,  besieged  and  taken. 

Mobile  is  the  home  of  some  Southern  celebrities ;  among  them  are  Admiral 
Semmes,  who  lives  peaceably  and  handsomely,  following  the  profession  of  law; 
Madame  Octavia  Walton  Le  Vert,  Augusta  J.  Evans,  authoress  of  "Beulah" 
and  one  or  two  other  ultra- scholastic  novels,  and  General  John  Forsyth,  ex- 
diplomat,  and  one  of  the  ablest  jour- 
nalists in  the  country.  The  Register, 
which  General  Forsyth  edits,  is  some- 
times a  little  bitter  in  partisan  politics, 
but  altogether  highly  creditable  to 
Mobile.  The  city  is  also  famous  for 
having  inaugurated  the  masked  secret 
societies,  which  have  lately  become 
such  a  feature  of  the  Southern  carnival, 
and  which  for  several  years  held  the 
field  with  the  "Cowbellions"  and  the 
"Strikers,"  whose  representations  were 
always  looked  forward  to  with  pleas- 
ure by  the  citizens  of  the  Gulf  coast. 
The  Cowbellions,  the  Strikers,  and 
the  "  T.  D.  A's,"  are  New  Year's  Eve 
societies  ;  and  among  the  Mardi-Gras 
companies  are  the  "  Order  of  Myths," 
and  the  "  H.  S.  S."  Not  even  the  war  and  the  depression  of  commerce  have 
been  able  to  deaden  the  jollity   of  the  genial  maskers. 

The  home  of  many  lovely  women,  Mobile  has  a  thoroughly  good  society, 
cultivated  and  frank,  and  the  assemblages  of  its  citizens  are  as  brilliant  gatherings 
as  are  to  be  found  in  the  country.  There  are  no  public  buildings  of  special 
beauty ;  the  Custom  -  House,  the  Odd  Fellows'  and  Temperance  Halls,  the 
Catholic  Cathedral,  the  First  Presbyterian  and  Christ  Churches,  Mobile  Col- 
lege, the  Academy,  the  Bank  of  Mobile,  are  all  pleasing  structures,  but  devoid 
of  any  remarkable  features.  Both  Catholics  and  Protestants  have  well-con- 
ducted orphan  asylums  ;  in  the  numerous  public  schools  the  white  and  black 
children  are  pretty  well  provided  for,  education  making  progress  as  grati- 
fying in  the  city  as  it  is  meagre  and  discouraging  in  the  country.  Immigration 
and  manufactures  would  make  of  Mobile  one  of  the  most  attractive  of  Southern 
towns ;  it  needs  but  a  little  aid  to  establish  itself  firmly  and  handsomely.  The 
cemetery  is  somewhat  dilapidated,  yet  filled  with  pretty  monuments  and  those 
sweetest  memorials  of  the  dead — a  profusion  of  delicious  flowers. 


Christ  Church  —  Mubilc,  Alabama. 


XXXIV. 

THE     RESOURCES      OF     ALABAMA — VISITS     TO      MONTGOMERY 

AND     SELMA. 

THAT  which  chiefly  astonishes  the  stranger  in  visiting  Alabama  is  that  the 
superb  material  resources  of  the  State  should  have  remained  undevel- 
oped so  long.  He  is  told  that,  in  a  little  less  than  a  century,  Alabama  expended 
two  hundred  millions  of  dollars  in  the  purchase  of  slaves ;  had  she  spent  it  in 
developing  her  elements  of  wealth,  she  would  have  been  to-day  one  of  the  richest 
commonwealths  in  the  world.  The  extraordinary  extent  and  nature  of  her  min- 
eral stores,  the  fertility  of  her  fields  for  cotton,  the  cereals  and  fruits,  the 
grandeur  of  her  forests,  the  length  of  her  streams,  and  her  lovely  climate,  will 
render  her,  after  the  dreary  transition  period  is  past,  one  of  the  most  opulent 
of  the  Southern  States. 

The  expedition  of  De  Soto  through  Alabama,  three  centuries  and  a-half  ago, 
was  among  the  most  remarkable  of  his  time.  This  brave  Spaniard,  with  his 
little  band,  while  pushing  across  the  new  and  hostile  country  to  the  harbor  at 
Pensacola,  where  ships  with  supplies  from  Havana  awaited  him,  was  attacked 
by  swarms  of  warriors  under  the  chief  Tuscaloosa,  at  an  Indian  town,  said 
to  have  been  near  the  present  site  of  Selma,  and  there  fought  one  of  the 
bloodiest  battles  of  early  American  history.  Turning  his  face  northward  and 
westward  once  more,  he  fought  his  way,  step  by  step,  to  the  Mississippi  river, 
leaving  the  savages  some  ghastly  memorials  of  Spanish  pluck  and  valor,  but 
having  done  nothing  toward  the  colonization  of  the  great  territory  later  known 
as  Alabama. 

One  hundred  and  sixty-two  years  thereafter,  another  European  expedi- 
tion appeared  at  Pensacola,  but  finding  the  Spaniards  in  possession  there,  cast 
anchor  at  Ship  Island,  and  finally  at  Biloxi.  Iberville,  who  had  been  com- 
missioned by  France  to  found  settlements  on  the  Mississippi,  planted  the  seed 
of  the  colonies,  which  Bienville  brought  to  such  abundant  harvest.  Slaves  were 
introduced  into  Alabama,  then  a  part  of  Louisiana,  under  the  regime  of  John 
Law's  great  Mississippi  Company,  and  rice  and  tobacco  and  indigo  were  success- 
fully cultivated.  A  little  more  than  a  century  after  the  first  French  occupation, 
Alabama  had  nearly  200,000  whites,  and  1 1 7,000  blacks  within  her  borders,  and 
seemed  springing  more  rapidly  into  development  than  most  of  the  other  States 
of  the  Union. 

The  area  of  Alabama  is  50,722  square  miles,  of  which  the  cotton  and  timber 
regions  comprise  about  10,000,  and  the  mineral  section  15,000  square  miles. 
The  cotton-fields  have  been  the  basis  of  the   State's  wealth,  and  will  continue 


ALABAMA    S      VARIED      RESOURCES.  329 

one  of  her  chief  supports ;  but  to  her  minerals  and  manufactures  must  she 
look  for  that  development  of  large  manufacturing  towns  and  wonderful  increase 
of  population  which  has  marked  the  growth  of  other  States,  uniting,  as  she  does, 
a  superabundance  of  agricultural  and  mineral  resources.  It  is  supposed  that  not 
more  than  half  the  available  cotton  lands  are  at  present  under  cultivation.  From 
the  rich  Tennessee  valley  to  the  fertile  Gulf  coast  there  is  such  a  combination  of 
natural  treasures  as  no  country  in  Europe  can  boast.  Alabama  can  produce  all 
the  grains  and  esculents  of  the  Northern  States,  yet  to-day  whole  sections  of  the 
State  are  dependent  on  the  North-west  for  bread,  because  the  foolish  "all 
•cotton"  policy  is  continued  from  slave  times. 

Lying  at  the  foot  of  the  Alleghany  mountains,  which,  in  the  north-western 
portion  of  the  State,  bow  their  giant  heads  stupidly,  and  lean  lazily  toward  the 
level  earth,  she  possesses  grand  mineral  beds,  similar  to  those  which  crop  out  at 
intervals  along  the  range  through  Pennsylvania,  Virginia  and  Tennessee.  Her 
river  system  is  one  of  the  noblest  on  the  continent.  It  comprehends  the  Tennes- 
see, which  courses  through  eight  northern  counties,  and  affords  a  fertile, 
although  somewhat  exhausted,  cotton  valley ;  the  Alabama  and  her  tribu- 
taries ;  and  the  Tombigbee,  the  Black  Warrior  and  the  Coosa.  These  are  all 
navigable.  The  Chattahoochee  river  is  the  boundary  line  between  Georgia  and 
Alabama;  and  in  the  lower  part  of  the  State  several  of  the  rivers  flowing 
through  Florida  to  the  Gulf  furnish  navigation  to  the  border  counties. 

The  improvement  of  the  Coosa  and  the  Cahawba  rivers,  so  that  they  shall  be 
navigable  all  the  way  from  the  mineral  fields  to  their  junction  with  the  Alabama, 
is  considered  of  the  utmost  importance.  Some  of  the  richest  iron  mines  and 
coal-fields  in  the  State  are  on  the  Upper  Coosa,  beyond  its  navigable  portion. 
Surveys  have  been  provided  for  under  the  reconstruction  governments,  but  as 
yet  little  has  been  accomplished.  The  upper  portion  of  the  Black  Warrior  river 
drains  the  Warrior  coal-field,  and  could  be  made  of  vast  service  in  future. 

The  opening  of  the  Coosa  river  would  give  to  the  markets  of  Montgomery 
and  Mobile  the  produce  of  a  section  of  Alabama  which  now  finds  its  outlet  in 
Georgia,  and  it  would  furnish  the  cotton  belt  of  the  State  with  cheap  grain — a 
most  important  consideration ;  while,  at  the  same  time,  it  will  afford  fine  water 
power  for  manufactures.  Mobile  is  anxious  to  become  a  grain  depot,  like  New 
Orleans,  for  the  corn  trade  of  the  West  with  Europe.  The  improvement  of  the 
Coosa  river  and  of  Mobile  harbor  would  accomplish  this. 

The  needed  opening  of  the  Tennessee  river,  which  I  have  alluded  to  else- 
where, would  be  of  the  greatest  value  to  Northern  Alabama ;  and  a  canal  from 
the  Tennessee  to  the  Coosa,  cut  through  at  a  point  where  the  streams  are  not 
more  than  forty  miles  apart,  would  give  a  continuous  water  line  from  the  north- 
west to  Mobile  bay.*  This  would  become  one  of  the  most  popular  and  eco- 
nomical of  national  highways,  and  would  be  lined,  throughout  Alabama,  with 
manufacturing  towns. 

The  timber  region  of  Alabama  comprises  a  belt  extending  entirely  across 
the  lower  portion  of  the  State,  bordering  on  Florida  and  the  Gulf.     It  is  rich  in 

*  "Alabama  Manuals." 


330  THE     ALABAMA      COTTON      REGION. 

forests  of  long-leaved  pine,  and  on  the  river  lowlands  grow  white,  black  and 
Spanish  oaks,  and  the  black  cypress.  Cotton  can  be  produced  in  the  light,  sandy- 
soil  of  this  section,  but  the  gathering  of  naval  stores  is  a  more  productive 
industry  in  these  border  counties.  Between  Mobile  and  Pascagoula  bays  many 
settlements  are  springing  up,  and  enterprising  young  men  from  the  North  and 
West  are  sending  millions  of  feet  of  lumber  to  the  New  Orleans  market.  The 
lands  can  be  purchased  for  a  trifle ;  and  there  are  many  small  bays  and 
estuaries  where  vessels  for  any  port  in  the  world  might  load  directly  at  the 
saw-mill. 

In  the  cotton  belt,  which  also  extends  across  Alabama,  from  the  Missis- 
sippi to  the  Georgia  line,  there  are  many  large  towns  which  would,  in  hap- 
pier times,  be  flourishing,  and  whose  appearance  testifies  to  a  long  reign  of 
wealth,  elegance,  and  culture  within  their  limits.  Montgomery,  Selma,  Demopo- 
lis,  Livingston,  Eutaw,  Greensboro,  Marion,  are  all  inhabited  or  surrounded  by 
planters  who  are,  or  have  once  been  wealthy,  and  who  have  gathered  about  them 
fine  private  schools,  libraries  and  churches. 

South-eastward  through  the  cotton  country,  from  the  capital,  runs  the  Mont- 
gomery, Eufaula  and  Brunswick  railroad,  intended  as  part  of  a  gigantic  line 
some  day  to  be  completed  from  Brunswick,  Georgia,  on  the  Atlantic  coast,  to 
Vicksburg,  on  the  Mississippi ;  and  other  lines  are  here  and  there  projected.  It 
often  occurs  to  one  that  Alabama  is  indulging  in  an  "overcrop"  of  railways, 
considering  the  abundance  of  her  superb  water-courses. 

The  soil  of  the  Alabama  cotton  belt  is  inexhaustibly  rich.  This  is  the  testi- 
mony of  all  observers,  native  and  foreign.  That  it  has  in  some  sections  been 
forced,  so  as  to  be,  for  a  time,  less  productive  than  usual,  there  can  be  no  doubt ; 
but  with  anything  like  decent  care  it  will  grow  cotton  as  long  as  will  the  soil  of 
Egypt.  But  there  has  been  a  terrible  fall  in  prices,  and  hundreds,  perhaps 
thousands,  of  planters  have  been  utterly  ruined.  Good  lands  there  once  com- 
manded $50  per  acre;  those  same  lands  now  command  possibly  $10,  in  some 
instances  $5.  The  enormous  fertility  of  this  section  is  shown  by  the  fact  that  in 
i860,  just  before  the  slave  system  was  broken  up,  it  produced  997,978,  almost 
1,000,000  bales  of  cotton,  or  one-fifth  of  the  whole  crop  of  the  United  States  for 
that  year.  The  planters  there,  as  elsewhere,  would  prefer  the  free  labor  which 
they  now  employ,  rather  than  slaves,  if  the  free  labor  could  be  relied  on  to  work 
with  a  view  to  getting  as  good  results  for  his  employer  as  the  slave  did  for  his 
owner. 

There  are,  of  course,  great  multitudes  of  negroes  on  these  cotton  lands,  who, 
as  a  rule,  labored  well,  in  spite  of  the  savage  reverses  experienced  by  the  whole 
planting  interest  of  Alabama  for  some  years,  until  the  continuous  disaster  dis- 
couraged them,  and  they  took  refuge  either  in  emigration  or  a  precarious 
dependence  upon  the  charity  of  others  but  little  richer  than  themselves.  But 
whatever  may  be  the  condition  of  large  planters,  or  of  the  freedmen,  who  are,  of 
course,  more  or  less  ignorant  and  irresponsible,  there  is  no  doubt  that  industrious 
and  capable  immigrants,  settling  in  the  cotton  belt,  and  carefully  cultivating  from 
forty  to  fifty  acres  of  land,  with  ten  in  cotton  and  an  equal  number  in  grain  and 


MONTGOMERY,      ALABAMA.  33I 

provisions,  could  become  wealthy.  The  main  suffering,  which  has  been  great 
in  Alabama,  has  occurred  because  the  people  raised  but  little  food.  Relying 
entirely  upon  cotton,  when  that  failed  they  found  themselves  penniless  and  starv- 
ing. This  suffering  does  not  come,  however,  save  when  the  crops  are  absolutely 
destroyed  by  caterpillars  or  by  rains.  If  the  Alabama  planters  could  succeed  for 
a  few  years,  they  might  have  money  to  invest  in  the  much  needed  local  manu- 
factures, but  at  present  they  have  none,  and  foreign  capital  does  not  flow  to  them. 
Going  from  Opelika,  by  rail,  to  Montgomery,  I  found  in  the  cars  the  usual 
number  of  rough  but  honest  folk  bound  for  Texas ;  a  sprinkling  of  commercial 
Hebrews,  who  bitterly  bewailed  the  misfortunes  attendant  on  the  failure  of  the 
cotton  crop  during  two  successive  years ;  and  some  very  intelligent  colored  men 
journeying  to  the  Legislature,  then  in  session. 

People  generally  complained  of  a  desperate  condition  of  affairs,  consequent 
upon  the  crop  failures,  and  spoke  with  bitterness  of  the  poverty  which  had  over- 
taken both  whites  and  blacks.  The  lands  around  Montgomery  were,  every  one 
admitted,  wonderfully  rich,  but  the  caterpillar  had  devastated  the  fields  as  fast  as 
the  planter  had  planted  them ;  and  the  consequence  was  that  many  persons  were 
not  only  overwhelmed  with  debt,  but  hardly  knew  where  they  were  to  get  any- 
thing to  eat.  My  visit  to  Montgomery  fully  demonstrated  to  me  that  these 
statements  were  in  no  wise  exaggerated. 

Montgomery  county,  in  which  the  capital  of  the  State  is  situated,  once  com- 
prehended a  large  portion  of  Central  Alabama,  but  now  includes  only  eight 
hundred  square  miles.  There  are  nearly  three  times  as  many  blacks  as  whites 
within  its  limits.  It  has  usually  been  considered  first  on  the  list  of  the  agricultural 
counties  of  the  State,  and  in  the  first  rank  in  wealth.  No  section  of  the  South, 
not  even  the  wonderfully  rich  Mississippi  delta,  offers  better  soil  for  the  growing 
of  cotton  and  corn.  The  undulating  prairie  and  the  fertile  alluvial  afford  every 
chance  for  the  amassing  of  riches.  Five  great  railways  run  through  the  town 
and  the  county,  and  the  river  navigation  is  excellent. 

It  was  difficult  to  conceive  how  this  marvelous  section  had  fallen  into  such 
decay  that  the  market-place  of  Montgomery  was  filled  with  auctioneers  presiding 
over  sheriffs'  sales,  and  that  there  was  a  general  complaint  of  poverty,  much  des- 
titution, and,  in  some  cases,  despair.  The  citizens  explained  that  the  failure  of 
the  "  crops  "  (the  crops  meaning  cotton)  during  two  years,  and  the  arrival  of  the 
panic,  had  completely  worsted  them.  The  negroes  employed  by  planters  were 
discharged  by  hundreds  when  the  panic  came,  and  having,  as  a  mass,  no  means, 
constituted  a  "  bread  or  blood  "  populace,  whose  presence  in  the  country  was  in 
the  highest  degree  embarrassing.  The  Mayor  of  the  city  gave  these  unfortunate 
people  charity  out  of  his  own  purse  for  a  long  time,  until  other  cities  and  towns 
rallied  and  sent  in  help.  Stealing  was,  of  course,  frequently  resorted  to  by  the 
freedmen  as  soon  as  they  were  idle,  and  the  whole  country  round  was  pillaged. 
Owing  to  the  ravages  of  the  caterpillar,  Montgomery's  tributary  crop,  which 
usually  amounts  to  60,000  or  70,000  bales,  had  fallen  to  one- third  that  amount. 
Montgomery  has  a  double  historic  interest  as  a  capital,  for  it  was  there  that 
the  Confederacy  first  established  its  seat  of  government ;  there  that  its  "  provis- 


332 


THE     STATE      CAPITOL MORTGAGE      SALES. 


ional  congress"  assembled  for  two  months;  and  the  house  occupied  at  that  time 
by  Jefferson  Davis  is  still  pointed  out.  The  town  is  prettily  situated  on  the 
Alabama  river,  and  used  to  export  100,000  bales  of  cotton,  much  of  which 
was  floated  down  the  current  of  the  great  stream.  As  a  manufacturing  centre,  it 
would  be  very  advantageous,  but,  although  Alabama  has  exempted  manufactures 
from  taxation,  no  effort  has,  as  yet,  been  made  there  to  establish  them.  Mont- 
gomery, therefore,  a  town  of  fourteen  thousand  inhabitants,  with  fair  transporta- 
tion facilities,  many  elegant  business  blocks,  fine  churches,  a  good  theatre,  an 
elegant  court-house,  and  a  mammoth  hotel,  has  a  valuation  of  only  $6,500,000, 
and  its  streets  are  filled  with  black  and  white  idlers. 

If  the  negroes  could  be  persuaded  to  show  the  same  industry  in  manufactur- 
ing that  they  do  in  attending  mortgage  sales,  the  section  would  not  lack  capable 
workers.  I  was  told  in  the  market  square  that  some  of  the  negroes  had  come 
sixty  miles — many  from  the  mountains  of  Coosa  county — to  attend  upon  the 
sales,  and  on  these  expeditions  were  accustomed  to  be  absent  from  their  farms 
for  days  together.      The  plantations  in  all  the  adjacent  belt  were  expected  to  go 

off  at  sheriffs'  sales  at  the  time  of 
my  visit.  How  many  of  them  the 
original  owners  managed  to  retain  in 
their  possession,  I"  know  not,  but  I 
think  the  number  must  have  been 
small. 

The  Capitol  building,  crowning  a 
fine  eminence,  from  which  one  could 
get  a  view  of  the  town  spread  out  over 
the  undulating  country,  was  surrounded 
with  the  usual  number  of  negroes,  old 
and  young,  who  seemed  to  have  no 
thought  whatever  for  the  morrow.  A 
few  gray-headed  Africans  were  seated 
on   the  gateway  steps  as  I  went  in, 

The  Alabama  State  Capitol  at  Montgomery.  and      HlOVed      lazily     and     grumblingly 

aside  to  let  me  pass.  The  colored  legislators  lounging  about  the  lobbies,  waiting 
for  the  session  to  begin,  were  of  a  rather  higher  type  than  those  in  South 
Carolina  and  Louisiana.  There  were  a  good  many  among  them  who  were  lightly 
tinctured  with  Caucasian  blood,  and  all  were  smartly  dressed  and  aggressive  in 
their  demeanor. 

When  the  "  House  "  assembled,  I  went  in,  and  found  the  honorable  repre- 
sentatives engaged  in  a  stirring  battle  over  some  measures  which  the  Conserva- 
tives desired  to  pass  before,  and  the  Radicals  to  hinder,  until  the  close  of  the 
session.  The  speaker,  the  Honorable  Lewis  E.  Parsons,  was  the  first  provisional 
Governor  under  reconstruction,  and  remained  in  office  until,  under  the  new 
constitution,  provision  had  been  made  for  the  election  of  a  Governor  and  General 
Assembly  in  1865,  He  is  a  good  Republican  and  an  honest  man,  and  has  done 
much  in  staying  the  tide  of  ignorance  and  oppression  from  overwhelming  the  State. 


RECONSTRUCTION      IN      ALABAMA.  333 

Alabama,  even  after  she  was  supposed  to  be  reconstructed,  flatly  refused  to 
recognize  the  Fourteenth  Amendment,  and  was  consequently  remanded  to  her 
provisional  condition  as  a  conquered  province,  and  Robert  M.  Patton,  the  suc- 
cessor of  Governor  Parsons,  found  himself  under  the  supervision  of  the  Brigadier- 
General  commanding  the  district,  of  which  Alabama  formed  a  part.  A  new 
constitutional  convention  was  held  ;  blacks  carried  over  whites  the  adoption  of  a 
constitution  in  complete  harmony  with  the  requirements  of  Congress,  and  in  the 
summer  of  1 868,  William  H.  Smith  became  the  Republican  Governor  of  the  State. 
Under  his  administration  began  the  era  of  domination  of  the  hybrid  legislature, 
and  it  is  not  surprising  that  the  State  was  shaken  to  its  centre  by  the  ensuing 
legislation.  The  Legislature  was  besieged  by  persons  interested  in  railway 
schemes,  and  the  State's  credit  was  pledged  in  the  most  prodigal  fashion.  At  the 
same  time  immigration  to  the  State  was  hindered  by  the  operations  of  the  Ku- 
Klux  and  by  the  exaggerated  bitterness  of  the  white  Alabamians,  who  did  not 
seem  willing  to  forgive  the  North  for  having  forced  negro  suffrage  upon  them ; 
and  in  the  counties  where  the  negroes  were  in  the  majority  there  was  the  mis- 
management, turmoil,  and  tyranny  which  prevailed  in  other  States  of  the  South. 
In  1870,  Robert  B.  Lindsay  was  elected  Governor,  but  Governor  Smith  refused  to 
vacate  his  office,  on  the  ground  that  Lindsay  had  been  fraudulently  elected,  and 
surrounded  himself  with  Federal  soldiers.  Lindsay  was,  however,  declared 
elected,  and  the  State  had  two  Governors  and  two  Legislatures,  until  Governor 
Smith  was  ousted  by  a  writ  from  the  Circuit  Court.  Governor  Lindsay  was 
succeeded,  in  1872,  by  David  P.  Lewis,  who  was  in  power  at  the  time  of  my 
visit.  The  various  railroad  complications  have  somewhat  impaired  the  State's 
credit,  and  Alabama  has  latterly  found  it  very  difficult  to  meet  the  interest  upon 
bonds  which  she  had  endorsed  for  some  of  the  new  railroad  enterprises.  The 
Alabama  and  Chattanooga  road,  the  Montgomery  and  Eufaula,  the  Selma  and 
Gulf  roads  have  all  aided  in  the  embarrassment  in  which  Alabama  is  plunged 
to-day  by  the  lamentable  condition  of  her  State  indebtedness. 

In  the  House  of  Representatives  the  colored  members  appeared  to  have 
voluntarily  taken  seats  on  one  side  of  the  house,  and  the  Conservatives,  who  were 
in  like  manner  assembled  on  the  other,  were  overwhelmed  by  a  deafening  chorus 
of  "  Mr.  Speaker !  "  from  the  colored  side,  whenever  they  proposed  any  measure. 
Sometimes  the  colored  opponents  would  show  that  they  misapprehended  the 
attitude  of  their  white  friends,  and  then  long  and  wearisome  explanations  and 
discussions  were  entered  upon,  enlivened  only  by  an  occasional  outburst  of  a 
dusky  member,  who  fiercely  disputed  the  floor  with  his  ex- master,  and  whose 
gestures  were  only  equaled  in  eccentricity  by  his  language.  The  Senate  was  a 
more  dignified  body ;  in  it  there  were  some  gentlemen  of  distinguished  presence 
and  considerable  eloquence. 

But  at  Montgomery,  as  elsewhere  throughout  the  reconstructed  States,  it  was 
easy  to  see  that  ignorance  and  corruption  had  done  much  to  injure  the  morale  of 
the  State.  The  worst  feature  observable  was  a  kind  of  political  stagnation  in  the 
minds  of  the  white  people — a  mute  consent  to  almost  any  misfortune  which 
might  happen.     This  was  more  dreadful  and  depressing  than  the  negro   igno- 

22 


334 


IGNORANCE — MANUFACTURES      IN     THE      STATE. 


ranee.  I  do  not  mean  to  have  it  inferred  that  the  whites  in  Alabama  are  all 
educated.  The  ignorance  of  the  poorer  white  classes  in  the  country  is  as  dense 
as  that  of  the  blacks ;  and  there  is  evidence  of  rough  and  reckless  manners 
of  living.     Nothing  but  education  and  a  thorough  culture  of  the  soil — a  genuine 


farming — will  ever 
build  up  the  broken 
fortunes  of  this  once 
wealthy  section  of 
Alabama.  Coming 
down     from     the 


The  Market-place  at  Montgomery,  Alabama. 


Capitol,  one  sunlit 
autumn  morning,  I 
was  fairly  amazed 
at  the  great  congre- 
gation of  idle  ne- 
groes in  the  market 


square.  They  were  squatted  at  corners  ;  they  leaned  against  walls,  and  cowered 
under  the  canvas  of  the  huge  country  wagons ;  they  chattered  like  magpies  at  the 
shop  doors,  and  swarmed  like  flies  around  the  cheap  and  villainous  grog-shops 
which  abounded.  No  one  was  at  work ;  none  had  any  thought  for  the  morrow. 
Those  with  whom  I  stopped  to  converse  "  cursed  their  dull  fate  "  in  the  mild, 
deprecatory  manner  peculiar  to  the  African.  Their  descriptions  of  the  caterpillar, 
who  feeds  upon  the  leaves  of  the  cotton  plant,  and  of  its  able  assistant,  the  boll- 
worm,  who  buries  himself  inside  the  cotton-boll,  and  feeds  on  it  until  it  is  entirely 
gone,  were  graphic  and  amusing,  but  it  would  require  almost  countless  pages 
to  translate  them  here. 

The  strip  of  country  extending  between  the  cotton  and  mineral  regions,  and 
running  from  the  north-east  to  the  middle  and  eastern  part  of  the  State,  is 
admirably  adapted  both  to  agriculture  and  manufactures.  Opelika,  Wetumpka, 
Centerville,  Tuscaloosa,  Scottsville,  Prattsville,  Tallassee,  Autaugaville,  and  other 
flourishing  towns,  are  located  in  it.  It  is  traversed  by  the  Selma  and  Rome, 
the  Montgomery  and  West  Point,  the  South  and  North,  and  the  Alabama  and 
Chattanooga  railroads. 

Lying  directly  on  the  high  road  between  New  York  and  New  Orleans,  and 
traversed  by  rivers  flowing  from  the  mountains  over  many  rocky  barriers  toward 
the  lowlands, — thus  forming  innumerable  falls  suitable  for  maufacturing  power, — 
it  has  already  attracted  much  attention,  and  many  factories  are  established 
within  its  limits.  A  number  of  prosperous  factories  were  destroyed  during  the 
war;  but  the  extensive  cotton-mills  at  Tallassee,  on  the  Tallapoosa  river,   the 


NEED      OF      CAPITAL THE      MINERALS      OF     ALABAMA.  335 

Granite  factory  in  Coosa  county,  the  mills  in  Prattsville,  and  the  Bell  factory 
near  Huntsville,  all  demonstrate  the  success  which  might  attend  similar  new 
enterprises. 

It  is  observed  that,  in  spite  of  the  cheapness  of  labor  in  England,  Alabama 
manufacturers  will  soon  be  able  to  take  cotton  from  adjacent  plantations,  spin 
it  into  yarn,  and  sell  it  in  England  at  a  greater  profit  than  the  English 
manufacturer,  who  buys  American  cotton  in  Liverpool  and  makes  it  into  yarn 
in  England,  can  ever  obtain.*  The  advantage  of  the  water  power  in  such  States 
as  Alabama  over  the  steam  power  necessarily  employed  in  Great  Britain  is  very 
large. 

The  crying  need  of  the  State  is  capital ;  she  is  like  so  many  of  her  neighbors, 
completely  broken  by  the  revolution,  and  unable  to  take  the  initiative  in  measures 
essential  to  her  full  development.  With  capital  operating  beneficently,  Alabama 
could  so  bring  her  cheap  cotton,  cheap  coal,  cheap  iron,  and  cheap  living,  to  bear, 
as  to  seize  and  firmly  retain  a  leading  position  among  manufacturing  States. 

North  of  the  manufacturing  region,  and  extending  160  miles  from  north-east 
to  south-west,  is  the  mineral  region  of  the  State.  Railroads  traverse  it  in  all 
directions ;  the  South  and  North  binds  it  to  Montgomery,  and  gives  it  an  outlet 
toward  Nashville  and  Louisville,  via  Decatur ;  the  Alabama  and  Chattanooga 
gives  it  easy  access  to  the  rolling-mills  of  Chattanooga ;  the  Selma,  Rome  and 
Dalton  cuts  through  it  to  connect  with  the  Kennesaw  route  to  New  York.  It  is 
as  yet  in  many  respects  a  wild  country,  sparsely  populated,  and  rough  in  appear- 
ance. In  one  day's  journey  along  the  line  of  the  North  and  South  railroad,  I  saw 
hardly  any  town  of  considerable  size ;  in  the  forest  clearings  there  were  assem- 
blages of  rough  board  houses,  and  brawny  men  and  scrawny  women  looked  from 
the  doors ;  now  and  then  we  passed  a  coal-shoot,  and  now  long  piles  of  iron  ore. 
There  was  little  of  interest  save  the  material  fact  of  the  abundant  riches  of  this 
favored  section.  The  mountains  were  nowhere  imposing ;  they  were  hump- 
backed and  overgrown ;  but  they  held,  it  was  easy  to  see,  mighty  secrets. 

There  are  three  distinct  coal-fields  in  the  carboniferous  formation,  which, 
with  the  silurian,  shares  all  but  the  south-east  corner  of  this  mineral  region. 

The  most  extensive  is  the  Warrior  field,  which  has  an  area  of  three  thousand 
square  miles  of  a  bituminous  soft  coal,  lying  in  horizontal  beds  from  one  to  four 
feet  thick.  It  covers  that  portion  of  the  State  drained  by  the  Black  Warrior 
river  and  its  tributaries,  and  extends  quite  into  the  north-eastern  corner,  between 
Lookout  mountain  and  the  Tennessee  river.  The  field  along  the  Cahawba  river 
has  beds  from  one  to  eight  feet  thick,  extending  over  an  area  of  700  square  miles. 
The  Tennessee  field,  north  of  the  Tennessee  river,  has  large  stores  of  bituminous 
coal,  and  the  three  together  cover  4,000  square  miles.     Close  beside  them,  from 

*  There  are  now  a  dozen  prosperous  cotton  factories  in  Alabama,  in  its  middle  and  northern 
portions.  The  Tallassee  mills  have  18,000  spindles;  two  at  Prattsville  have  4,000  each;  and 
others,  averaging  about  the  same,  at  Huntsville,  Florence,  Tuscaloosa,  Autaugaville,  and  in 
Pickens  county,  are  prosperous.  These  mills  regularly  pay  large  dividends;  it  is  not  uncommon 
for  cotton-mills  in  the  South  to  pay  twenty  per  cent.,  and  twelve  to  fifteen  is  the  average. 
White  labor  exclusively  is  employed. 


336  BIRMINGHAM RED      MOUNTAIN. 

north-east  to  south-west,  run  beds  of  red  and  brown  hematite,  and  limestone  and 
sandstone  are  near  at  hand.  The  South  and  North  railroad  runs  through  the 
Warrior  coal-field  for  more  than  fifty  miles.  It  is  surprising  that,  with  such 
superb  facilities  for  transportation,  more  has  not  been  done  toward  the  devel- 
opment of  this  section.  Grand  highways  run  in  all  the  principal  directions 
across  iron-beds ;  a  few  branch  tracks  only  being  needed  to  cover  every  square 
mile  with  a  network  of  communication. 

I  made  a  journey  to  Birmingham,  the  four-year-old  child  of  the  mineral 
development,  and  was  surprised  to  note  how  solidly  it  had  grown  up.  The  route, 
from  Montgomery  to  within  a  few  miles  of  Calera,  where  the  Selma,  Rome  and 
Dalton  road  crosses  the  South  and  North,  lay  through  forests  of  yellow  pine. 
We  saw  few  farms  and  but  little  cleared  land.  A  little  above  Calera,  we  came 
into  the  Coosa  river  section.  That  stream  runs  to  the  eastward  of  the  railroad, 
and  for  many  miles  offers  excellent  sites  for  the  establishment  of  manufactures. 
Lime-kilns  are  to  be  seen  scattered  all  through  the  country ;  one  hundred  and 
fifty  thousand  barrels  of  lime  being  annually  made,  it  is  said,  at  and  near  Calera. 
The  blue  limestone  of  the  silurian  formation,  so  abundant  there,  is  especially 
valuable.  The  road  also  traverses  the  zone  of  the  deposits  of  fibrous  brown 
hematite,  extending  north-easterly  from  Tuscaloosa,  where  it  is  said  to  be  a 
hundred  feet  thick.  On  this  ore  belt  several  prosperous  furnaces — the  Roup's 
Valley,  the  Briarfield,  the  Shelby,  and  the  Oxford  —  are  located.  An  able 
engineer,  Mr.  Hiram  Haines,  of  Alabama,  says  that  the  cost  of  the  reduction  of 
this  iron  at  these  furnaces  is  about  twenty  dollars  per  ton. 

Crossing  the  Cahawba  coal-field,  and  Red  mountain,  which  forms  the  western 
boundary,  I  came  into  the  valley  of  Shades  creek,  which  presents  a  very  advan- 
tageous position  for  the  location  of  iron  works.  Here  are  the  Red  Mountain  and 
Irondale  Iron  Works,  whose  furnaces  can  produce  forty  tons  daily.  The  vast 
bed  of  fossiliferous  ore  which  extends  along  the  northern  ridge  of  Red  mountain 
runs  from  a  point  a  score  of  miles  east  of  Tuscaloosa  to  the  north-eastern  limit  of 
the  State.  Where  the  railway  crosses  it,  it  is  thirty  feet  in  thickness.  Like 
its  famous  compeer  in  Missouri,  the  "mountain"  hardly  merits' its  name,  being 
simply  an  elevated  ridge.  The  ore  is  everywhere  easily  accessible ;  I  noted  from 
point  to  point  very  successful  excavations  close  to  the  railroad.  The  "mountain" 
is  said  to  be  one  hundred  miles  in  length,  and  it  is  estimated  that  it  bears  fifteen 
million  tons  of  iron  ore  to  the  mile. 

The  Pennsylvania  iron-masters  have  not  allowed  this  ore  to  go  unnoticed,  and 
the  English  have  made  it  an  especial  study.  A  little  beyond  the  gap  which 
allows  the  railroad  to  leave  the  coal-field,  the  projected  route  of  the  Mobile  Grand 
Trunk  road  crosses  the  South  and  North ;  and,  a  short  distance  farther  on,  at 
the  intersection  of  the  Alabama  and  Chattanooga  with  the  South  and  North, 
the  town  of  Birmingham  has  sprung  into  a  praiseworthy  activity.  In  eighteen 
months  from  the  date  of  building  the  first  house  there  was  a  permanent 
population  of  four  thousand  people.  The  town  was  handsomely  laid  out  in 
streets  lined  with  imposing  brick  blocks,  and  the  two  finely  built  railways  run- 
ning through  it  brought  to  it  crowds  of  daily  visitors.      If  the  development  of  the 


DESCRIPTION      OF     BIRMINGHAM'S      RESOURCES.  337 

South  justifies  the  building  of  the  proposed  route  from  Atlanta,  Georgia,  through 
Birmingham  to  connect  with  the  Southern  Trans- Continental;  of  the  connecting 
link  from  Opelika  north-westerly  through  Birmingham  to  the  Tennessee  at  Pitts- 
burg Landing ;  of  the  Grand  Trunk  road,  and  the  Ashley  branch  of  the  Selma, 
Rome  and  Dalton  road,  giving  a  short  line  from  the  coal  and  iron  country  to  the 
Gulf — the  new  mineral  capital  will  be  indeed  fortunate  ! 

Birmingham  is  very  centrally  located  in  the  mineral  region,  which  comprises 
most  of  Shelby,  Jefferson,  Bibb,  Walker,  Tuscaloosa,  Blount,  St.  Clair,  Calhoun, 
Talladega,  Randolph,  and  Cherokee  counties.  Red  mountain  seems  to  have 
been  pushed  above  the  unattractive  soil  in  these  rude  fields  as  a  beacon,  and 
a  temptation  to  explorers.  It  looms  up  in  Jones's  valley,  the  site  of  Birming- 
ham, as  the  creator  and  guardian  of  the  little  city's  destinies,  and  offers  its 
treasures  freely  to  the  miner,  the  iron  being  covered  with  but  a  thin  coating  of 
soil.  The  Red  mountain  ores  have  a  usual  yield  of  fifty  to  fifty-eight  per  cent ; 
and  this  mountain  stretches,  a  narrow  strip,  for  miles  and  miles,  between  two 
of  the  most  wonderful  coal-beds  on  the  continent! 

On  my  arrival  at  Birmingham,  one  afternoon,  I  found  the  good  Mayor  of  the 
little  city  in  bed,  he,  with  other  citizens,  having  been  engaged  all  the  previous 
night  in  quelling  a  negro  riot,  caused  by  the  discontent  and  pressing  necessities 
of  the  inhabitants  of  the  back-country.  An  armed  band  of  blacks  had  ridden 
into  the  town,  and  some  fires  had  been  started  in  a  low  quarter,  evidently  with 
the  design  of  diverting  attention  to  the  conflagration  while  the  provision  stores 
were  robbed.  But  the  citzens  succeeded  in  capturing  the  would-be  robbers,  and 
providing  them  with  food  and  lodging  in  jail.  This  incident  served  to  show  the 
really  hazardous  position  in  which  the  negro  is  placed  in  some  portions  of  the 
State.  Untoward  circumstances  and  outside  financial  pressure  leave  him  abso- 
lutely without  anything  to  eat ;  for  he  depends  almost  entirely  on  the  outer 
world  for  his  supplies. 

Birmingham  lies  in  the  centre  of  a  charming  valley  about  ten  miles  wide, 
and  about  eighty  miles  in  length.  It  is,  perhaps,  six  hundred  feet  above 
the  sea-level,  and  the  valley  is  supposed  to  be  the  result  of  a  vast  upheaval 
of  the  silurian  rocks,  which  upheaval  or  convulsion  was  evidently  instrumental 
in  dividing  what  was  one  huge  coal-field  into  several.  Another  result  of  the 
rupture  is  a  range  of  hills  running  down  the  centre  of  the  valley,  and  contain- 
ing deposits  of  brown  hematite.  Along  the  slope  of  the  Red  mountain  there 
is  a  notable  outcrop  of  variegated  marble  and  sulphate  of  barytes,  and  lead 
ores  are  scattered  throughout  the  neighborhood.  The  hematites  on  the  north- 
eastern slope  of  the  Red  mountain  are  exposed  for  a  thickness  of  from  fifteen 
to  twenty-five  feet ;  and  many  believe  that  a  complete  examination  will  show 
deposits  one  hundred  feet  thick.  Here  is  a  supply  of  iron  for  centuries  to  come ; 
but  Birmingham  does  not  depend  on  the  Red  mountain  alone.  To  the  west, 
the  north-west,  and  the  north,  there  are  fine  deposits  of  ore,  situated  close  to 
coal  unsurpassed  in  quality  for  the  manufacture  of  iron.  The  Elyton  Land 
Company,  which  owned  extensive  tracts  in  Jones's  valley,  took  the  initiative  in 
building  Birmingham,  and  succeeded  so  well  that  the  little  town  is  expected  to 


338  FACILITIES  FOR  MINING. 

have  a  cotton  factory  and  extensive  car  shops,  as  well  as  to  be  girdled  by  a  ring 
of  iron-furnaces.  In  the  vicinity  there  are  already  numerous  furnaces.  Pennsyl- 
vania iron-masters  are  developing  Irondale ;  the  Red  Mountain  Iron  Works  are 
undergoing  revival,  after  a  long  sleep  since  the  war;  and  the  largest  Southern 
and  English  firms  interested  in  iron  manufacture  are  investigating  the  resources 
of  Alabama  iron  tracts.  The  coal  interests  are  receiving  equal  attention,  and 
shafts  have  been  sunk  in  the  Warrior  and  Cahawba  fields.  The  Irondale  and 
Ironton  furnaces  are  undoubtedly  the  most  extensive  on  Red  mountain,  the  two 
together  producing  about  forty  tons  of  pig-iron  daily,  while  the  Alabama  Iron 
Company,  located  seventeen  miles  above  Birmingham,  is  yearly  sending  North 
great  quantities  of  ore.  All  the  way  from  Jefferson  county,  through  St.  Clair, 
until  it  loses  itself  in  the  Lookout  range,  the  Red  mountain1  carries  abundant 
stores.  In  Cherokee,  Calhoun  and  Talladega  counties,  within  easy  reach  of 
the  Selma,  Rome  and  Dalton  railroad,  there  are  furnaces  in  operation.  At  the 
Shelby  Iron  Works,  in  Shelby  county,  there  is  an  extensive  foundry  for  working 
up  the  famous  "brown  ore."  The  Briarfield  Iron  Works,  in  Bibb  county, 
are  also  famous,  and  in  Clay  county  it  is  believed  that  there  are  sufficient 
indications  of  magnetic  ore  to  justify  the  establishment  of  furnaces.  It  is  evident 
that  a  large  town  is  to  arise  at  some  point  in  this  region,  and  Birmingham  seems 
to  have  secured  the  precedence.  ' 

The  stores  of  copper  and  marl  in  Alabama  are  quite  remarkable.  In  Ran- 
dolph, Clay  and  Coosa  counties,  copper  has  been  mined  successfully,  and  lead 
has  been  found  m  Baker  county.  Gold  has  been  mined  from  time  to  time  since 
1843,  in  Eastern  Alabama,  being  found  in  small  quantities.  Silver  shafts  are  said 
to  have  been  sunk  there  by  De  Soto.  The  marble,  granite  and  slate  quarries  of 
the  State  are  rich,  and  will  furnish  cheap  material  for  future  cities,  when  the  iron 
interest  shall  begin  to  build  them.  Of  tin,  plumbago,  fire-clay,  and  kaolin  and 
lime,  there  are  abundant  stores.  The  marls  of  Alabama  are  expected,  in  due 
time,  to  furnish  a  very  important  branch  of  industry.  They  contain  properties 
of  the  highest  fertilizing  character  when  applied  to  worn-out  lands,  and  offer  the 
sections  of  the  State  which  have  been  overworked  under  the  old  planting  system 
a  chance  of  renewal.    .. 

It  is  certain  that  large  manufacturing  communities  are  to  spring  up  within  the 
next  few  years,  in  the  mineral  region  of  Northern  and  North-eastern  Alabama. 
The  facility  with  which  iron,  coal  and  limestone  can  be  reached,  mined,  and  sent 
to  furnaces  or  to  market ;  the  cheapness  of  labor  and  land,  and  the  facilities  for 
intercommunication,  both  by  rail  and  water,  are  great  recommendations.  The 
iron  ores  are  so  rich,  and  such  fine  steel  can  be  readily  made  from  them,  that 
they  are  certain  to  tempt  capitalists  to  unearth  them.  The  manufactured  iron 
can  be  produced  at  about  the  same  price  as  that  of  the  cheapest  regions  in 
England. 

The  Alabama  and  Chattanooga  railroad,  consolidated  from  several  lines,  and 
purchased  by  a  number  of  Boston  capitalists,  runs  through  the  beautiful  Wills' 
valley,  near  Chattanooga,  and  will,  doubtless,  draw  much  of  the  mineral  interest 
of  the  Alabama  district  toward  that  city. 


XXXV. 

NORTHERN     ALABAMA — THE     TENNESSEE     VALLEY — TRAITS     OF 
CHARACTER — EDUCATION. 

THERE  is  much  of  quiet  beauty  in  Northern  Alabama,  much  also  that  is  bold, 
rugged,  even  grand.  The  Tennessee  valley  seems  to  combine  the  love- 
liest characteristics  of  a  Northern,  with  all  the  fragrant  luxuriance  and  voluptu- 
ousness of  a .  Southern  climate.  Here  and  there  arise  grand  mountains  ;  one 
encounters  rapids  and  noisy  waterfalls ;  vast  stretches  of  forest ;  huge  areas 
covered  by  ill-kept  and  almost  ruined  plantations,  where  the  victims  of  the  revo- 
lution are  struggling  with  the  mysteries  of  the  labor  question,  and  the  changing 
influences  of  the  times.  The  Memphis  and  Charleston  railway,  which  runs 
through  this  valley  from  Chattanooga,  and  which  is  the  connecting  link  in  the 
great  through  route  from  the  Mississippi  to  the  Atlantic  ocean,  has  done  much  in 
developing  the  country,  but  does  not  seem  to  have  increased  population  to  any 
large  degree.  There  are  some  handsome  and  thriving  towns  along  its  line  ; 
pretty  Huntsville,  Decatur,  Tuscumbia  with  its  miraculous  spring,  and  Florence, 
Tuscumbia's  near  neighbor,  at  the  present  head  of  navigation  on  the  Tennessee, 
with  its  cotton  factory,  are  all  indications  of  the  beauty  and  vivacity  which 
this  section  will  boast  when  new  people  come  in.  At  Stevenson,  whither  the 
Nashville  and  Chattanooga  railroad  comes  in  its  search  for  a  passage  through  the 
apparently  impassable  mountains,  the  beauty  of  the  great  ranges  is  indescribable. 
The  red  loam  of  the  valley  will  produce  the  best  of  cotton  and  corn,  rye  and  bar- 
ley, and  small  farmers,  in  this  favorable  climate,  and  with  some  little  capital  to 
start  upon,  could  once  more  give  this  section  its  old  name  of  "the  garden  of  the 
South."  The  large  plantations  are  much  neglected,  in  many  cases  ruined;  the 
planters  are  discouraged,  and  the  negroes  perplexed  and  somewhat  demoralized 
by  the  great  changes  of  the  past  few  years.  There  has  undoubtedly  been  a  large 
falling  off  in  the  amount  of  cotton  production  in  this  section  of  Alabama,  since 
the  close  of  the  war ;  and  as  the  trail  of  the  armies  through  it  was  marked  with 
blood  and  fire,  it  is,  perhaps,  not  very  astonishing  that  the  delay  in  restoration 
has  been  so  great.  If  any  portion  of  the  South  needs  a  total  renewal  of  its 
population,  it  is  this  one  ;  and  an  influx  of  Northern  or  foreign  farmers  would 
build  it  up  in  a  short  time. 

Inasmuch  as  the  Tennessee  river  passes  through  the  entire  breadth  of  North 
Alabama  from  east  to  west,  the  State  is  as  much  interested  as  Tennessee  in  the 
opening  of  navigation  at  Muscle  Shoals,  feeling  convinced  that  the  manufacturing 
interests  at  Florence  would  be  revivified,  that  the  valley  would  thus  secure  a 
cheap  transportation  route  to  market,  and  that  the  carrying  of  minerals,  especially 
coal,  would  be  made  one  of  the  great  businesses  of  the  section. 


340  TOWNS      IN     THE     TENNESSEE      VALLEY. 

Huntsville  has  the  honor  of  being  the  county  seat  of  the  richest  agricultural 
county  in  the  Tennessee  valley,  and  is  noted  as  the  location  of  the  convention 
that  formed  the  State  constitution,  as  the  seat  of  the  first  Legislature  of  the  com- 
monwealth, and  the  place  at  which  the  first  Alabama  newspaper  was  issued. 
The  city,  which  has  some  five  thousand  inhabitants,  sits  upon  a  low  hill,  from 
whose  base  gushes  out  a  limestone  spring,  ample  enough  to  supply  the  popula- 
tion with  water.  Through  this  country  the  weight  of  war  was  felt  heavily ;  the 
people  of  Huntsville  suffered  much,  and  the  devastation  in  the  country,  caused 
by  both  armies,  was  very  great.  Huntsville  has  some  fine  schools  for  young 
ladies;  the  Greene  Academy,  a  resort  of  great  numbers  of  the  young  men  of 
Tennessee,  was  destroyed  during  the  war  by  the  Union  troops. 

Decatur  was  nearly  submerged  when  I  saw  it,  so  that  I  can  'hardly  attempt  a 
description.  Rain  poured  heavily  down ;  the  Tennessee,  on  whose  south  bank 
the  town  lies,  was  rampant,  and  the  railroad  seemed  running  through  a  lake. 
From  Decatur  toward  Nashville,  Tennessee,  the  railway  route  leads  through  a 
wild,  hilly  country,  where  the  land  is  not  especially  good.  Tuscumbia  also 
suffered  greatly  in  war  time.  It  is  noted  for  a  spring,  like  Huntsville,  but  that  of 
Tuscumbia  is  of  pure  freestone  water,  and  springing  from  the  plain  in  which  the 
town  is  built,  discharges  17,000  cubic  feet  of  water  every  minute.  Florence  is 
connected  with  Tuscumbia  by  a  branch  of  the  Memphis  and  Charleston  road, 
and  was  once  a  formidable  commercial  rival  to  Nashville.  It  was  hindered  by 
the  war  from  completing  the  fine  manufacturing  enterprises  which  it  was  inaugur- 
ating, but  is  now  making  new  efforts  to  centralize  cotton  spinning  there.  The 
Wesleyan  University  and  the  Synodical  Institute,  flourishing  institutions, "  are 
located  at  Florence. 

Farmers,  and  real  farming, — not  a  loose  planting  and  dependence  on  cotton, — 
are  the  principal  needs  of  this  section  of  the  Tennessee  valley. 

The  people  of  Alabama  are  as  varied  as  is  the  topography  of  their  lovely 
State,  but  most  of  them  distinguished  for  frankness  and  generosity  of  character. 
It  is  a  land  of  beautiful  women ;  one  even  now  and  then  sees  among  the 
degraded  poor  whites,  who  "dip  snuff"  and  talk  the  most  outrageous  dialect, 
some  lovely  creature,  who  looks  as  poetic  as  a  heathen  goddess,  until  one  hears 
her  speak,  or  she  pulls  from  her  pocket  a  pine  stick,  with  an  old  rag  saturated 
in  snuff  wrapped  around  it,  and  inserts  it  between  her  dainty  lips. 

Here  and  there,  in  my  journeys  up  and  down  the  State,  I  saw  the  tall,  long- 
haired, slender  men  who  were  so  common  a  sight  in  the  Alabama  regiments 
during  the  war,  and  whose  extraordinary  height  sometimes  puzzled  even  the 
giants  from  M,aine  and  Minnesota.  The  countrymen  in  the  interior  districts  were 
much  like  those  all  through  the  cotton  districts,  bounded,  prejudiced  and  ignorant 
of  most  things  outside  the  limits  of  their  State ;  difficult  to  drive  into  any  con- 
clusion, but  easy  to  lead ;  generally  conciliatory  in  their  demeanor  toward 
Northerners,  but  possessed  of  some  little  distrust  of  their  alert  and  earnest  ways. 
The  gentlemen  of  means  and  culture  whom  I  met  were  charming  companions, 
and  usually  accomplished.  They  had  the  flavor  of  the  country  gentleman,  and 
much  of  his  repose,  with  the  breeding  and  training  of  city  life. 


OCCASIONAL     BITTERNESS     AND     OSTRACISM.  34I 

Of  course  I  encountered  many  bitter  people — men  who  were  not  at  all  friendly 
toward  the  North,  and  who  declared  that  they  were  dissatisfied  with  the  present 
condition  of  affairs;  who  cursed  the  negro,  their  own  fate  and  the  Federal  Admin- 
istration ;  but  these  were  certainly  the  exceptions.  The  citizens  of  Alabama,  as 
a  mass,  are  as  loyal  to  the  idea  of  the  Union  to-day  as  are  the  citizens  of  New 
York,  and  have  at  times  gone  very  far  to  welcome  such  reconstruction  measures 
as  are  not  instruments  of  oppression.  In  the  sections  where  the  lands  are 
exhausted  for  the  time  being,  or  where  crops  have  failed  persistently,  and  the 
wolf  of  poverty  is  at  the  door,  people  have  ceased  to  take  any  interest  in  State 
affairs,  and  are  settling  up  their  business  and  hastening  to  Texas.  Now  and  then 
one  sees  a  few  tired  and  soiled  men  and  women  on  the  trains,  and  on  inquiring 
their  destination,  finds  they  are  on  the  return  from  Texas,  which  has  not  treated 
them  as  kindly  as  they  anticipated ;  but,  as  a  rule,  those  who  go  remain. 

Here  and  there  ostracism  shows  itself.  There  is  some  bitterness  in  Mobile, 
but  I  doubt  if  ordinarily  a  Northern  Republican,  voting  there  conscientiously  for 
the  best  men, — not  installing  ignorance  and  vice  in  power  under  the  Republican 
colors, — would  be  criticised  on  account  of  his  sentiments.  In  the  back-country 
he  would  meet  with  more  intolerance.  The  negro  has  such  absolute  freedom  in 
Alabama  that  the  whites  have  long  ago  given  up  any  endeavor,  save  at  election 
times,  to  check  his  extravagances.  There  is  a  law  which  prevents  challenge  at  the 
polls,  and  gives  the  right  to  the  challenged  party  to  sue  for  damages.  When  a 
native  Southerner  turns  and  joins  the  Republicans,  he  is  usually  pretty  thoroughly 
ostracised ;  and  this  was  the  case  with  the  gentleman  who  was  Mayor  of  Mobile 
when  I  visited  that  city.  As  soon  as  he  had  joined  the  dominant  party,  he  was 
"cut"  in  all  the  social  relations ;  his  wife  and  children  were  badly  treated,  and  no 
name  was  thought  too  harsh  to  apply  to  him,  although  he  had  once  been 
considered  a  citizen  of  distinction. 

In  some  of  the  towns,  as  in  Montgomery,  and  smaller  communities  in  the 
region  where  the  most  distress  prevails,  the  negroes  seem  to  be  absolutely  depend- 
ent upon  the  charity  of  the  white  folks.  Their  lives  are  grossly  immoral,  and  the 
women  especially  have  but  little  conception  of  the  true  dignity  of  womanhood. 
One  sees  men  and  women,  like  Italian  and  Spanish  beggars,  slouching  all  day, 
from  sun  to  shade,  from  shade  to  sun,  living  on  garbage  and  the  results  of  begging 
and  predatory  expeditions — a  prey  to  any  disease  that  comes  along,  and  fester- 
ing in  ignorance.  Some  of  them  have  been  trying  agriculture,  and  have  given  it 
up  in  disgust,  because  they  do  not  understand  farming,  and  there  is  no  one  to 
teach  them.  They  have  flocked  into  the  towns,  and  there  remain,  seemingly 
nourishing  a  vague  idea  that  something  will  turn  up.  It  often  struck  me  that  the 
thousands  of  idle  negroes  I  saw  were  in  the  attitude  of  waiting.  Their  expectant 
air  was  almost  pathetic  to  witness.  It  was  the  same  thing  which  we  so  often 
remark  in  animals — that  quaint  and  curious,  yet  despairing  look  in  the  eyes  and 
poise  of  the  body,  which  seemed  to  say  :  "  I  would  like  to  read  the  riddle  of  my 
relation  to  the  universe,  but  I  cannot."  So  they  occupy  themselves  lazily  in 
lounging  about  the  sheriff's  sales  of  mortgaged  property, — always  a  prominent 
sight  in  the  South  now-a-days,  alas  ! — or  in  begging  of  citizens  and  strangers 


342  ALABAMA'S      NEEDS EDUCATION. 

with  the  greatest  persistency.  On  the  plantations  they  are  the  same  as  every- 
where else  in  the  cotton  States  :  not  always  honest  when  they  work  for  other 
people,  and  reckless  and  improvident  when  they  work  for  themselves. 

That  there  is  plenty  of  enterprise  in  the  State,  there  can  be  no  doubt — no 
more  doubt  than  that  there  is  no  money  to  assist  it.  Indeed,  it  is  safe  to  predict 
for  Alabama  a  sudden  upspringing  sometime  into  a  marvelous  growth,  something 
like  that  of  Texas,  because  the  railroad  communication  is  already  so  perfect,  and 
the  resources  are  so  immense.  As  soon  as  a  little  money  is  accumulated,  or 
foreign  capital  has  gained  courage  to  go  in,  we  shall  see  an  awakening  in  the 
beautiful  commonwealth.  It  is  rich  in  grand  mountains,  noble  rivers,  swelling 
prairies,  mighty  forests,  lovely  sea-coast,  and  everywhere  there  is  a  wealth  of 
Southern  blossom  and  perfume.  The  Northerner  from  America  or  Europe  can 
readily  accommodate  himself  to  its  climate,  and  can  find  any  combination  of 
resources  that  he  may  desire  to  develop. 

Something  should  be  done  to  arrest  the  drainage  toward  Texas ;  it  is  dwarf- 
ing the  development  of  the  Alabamian  towns,  and  leaving  them  in  an  unpleasant 
predicament.  There  is  a  very  large  discouraged  class  in  the  State — people  who 
were  willing  enough  at  the  close  of  the  war  to  accept  its  main  results,  and  to 
devote  themselves  to  a  rebuilding,  but  who  have  been  so  embarrassed  and  hin- 
dered by  the  anomalous  condition  of  labor  and  politics,  and  are  so  destitute  of 
means  with  which  to  carry  on  new  enterprises,  that  they  prefer  to  fly  to  newer 
States. 

The  spirit  of  nationality  among  the  people  in  those  sections  of  Alabama 
which  have  suffered  most,  has  been  somewhat  broken,  yet,  according  to  the 
statement  made  to  me  by  one  of  the  most  distinguished  of  Alabama's  citizens, 
these  same  people  need  but  the  return  of  a  little  prosperity  to  make  them  con- 
tented. 

The  commonwealth  labors  under  a  dreadful  burden  of  ignorance ;  the  illit- 
eracy in  some  sections  is  appalling.  With  a  population  of  a  little  over 
1,000,000,  Alabama  has  more  than  380,000  persons  who  can  neither  read  nor 
write;  and  of  these  nearly  100,000  are  whites.  There  are  also  large  classes  who 
can  both  read  and  write,  but  whose  education  goes  no  farther.  Among  the 
175,000  voters  in  the  State,  there  is  a  newspaper  circulation  of  40,000  only. 
The  negro  does  not  seem  to  care  for  the  papers.  A  good  public  school  system 
was  inaugurated  in  Alabama  in  1854,  and  three  years  later  nearly  90,000  children 
were  attending  school  in  the  State ;  but  the  advent  of  the  war  annulled  the 
progress  already  made,  and  since  reconstruction  educational  matters  have  been 
somewhat  embroiled.  The  conduct  of  the  schools  is  now  in  the  hands  of  what  is 
known  as  the  State  Board  of  Education,  composed  of  the  State  Superintendent 
and  two  members  from  each  Congressional  district.  This  Board  has  full  Legisla- 
tive powers,  the  Legislature  being  only  revisory  of  its  acts.  The  school  fund 
receives  from  $500,000  to  $600,000  annually  from  the  State,  one-third  of  it 
being  interest  on  the  fund  bestowed  by  the  General  Government,  and  the 
remainder  being  made  up  of  one-fifth  of  the  commonwealth's  general  revenue — 
all  the  poll  tax,  the  licenses,  and  the  tax  on  insurance  companies.     This  fund  is 


CLOSING     OF     THE      SCHOOLS      IN      1873. 


343 


nominally  apportioned  impartially  to  the  whites  and  blacks  in  each  county,  and 
the  trustees  in  each  township  are  informed  what  their  share  is.  Under  this 
system,  the  average  attendance  at  the  various  schools  opened  throughout  the 
State,  has  been  150,000;  but  in  1873  the  schools  were  all  closed  (save  those  in  the 
large  cities)  on  account  of  the  inability  of  the  State  to  pay  teachers  !  This  cessa- 
tion has  been  productive  of  much  harm  and  disorganization.  Efforts  have,  how- 
ever, been  made  to  resuscitate  the  State  University  at  Tuscaloosa,  which  is  not  in 
a  flourishing  condition,  and  a  normal  college,  for  teachers  of  both  sexes,  has  been 
started  at  Florence,  in  the  northern  part  of  the  State.  In  Western  Alabama,  a 
colored  university  and  normal  college  has  been  established  at  Marion,  and  a 
colored  normal  school  is  opened  at  Huntsville.  The  American  Missionary 
Society  also  maintains  a  college  for  colored  people  at  Talladega. 


The  Cotton-Plant. 


XXXVI. 

THE     SAND-HILL     REGION  —  AIKEN  —  AUGUSTA. 

AFTER  many  weeks  of  journeying  in  the  South,  through  regions  where 
hardly  a  house  is  to  be  seen,  where  the  villages,  looming  up  between 
patches  of  forest  or  canebrake,  seem  deserted  and  worm-eaten,  and  the  people 
reckless  and  idle,  the  traveler  is  struck  with  astonishment  and  delight  when  he 
emerges  into  the  busy  belt  extending  from  Aiken,  in  South  Carolina,  to  Augusta, 
in  Georgia.  There  he  sees  manufacturing  villages,  hears  the  whir  of  spindles, 
notes  on  every  hand  evidences  of  progressive  industry,  and  wonders  why  it  was 


not  so  years  before.  Alas!  who  can 
compute  the  sum  of  the  lost  opportu- 
nities of  the  Southern  States  ? 

This  "sand-hill  region,"  extending 
from  the  north-eastern  border  of  South 
Carolina  to  the  south-eastern  border  of 
Georgia,  has  many  noteworthy  aspects. 
Its  climate  has  wonderful  life-renewing 

properties  for  the  invalid  worn  down  with  the  incessant  fatigues  and  changes  of 
severer  latitudes,  and  its  resources  for  the  establishment  of  manufactures,  and 
for  the  growth  of  some  of  the  most  remarkable  and  valuable  fruits,  are  unrivaled. 


THE     SAND-HILL     REGION AIKEN,     SOUTH     CAROLINA.  345 

The  upper  limit  of  the  sand-hills  in  South  Carolina  is  very  clearly  defined. 
They  are  usually  found  close  to  the  rivers,  and  are  supposed  to  be  ancient 
sand -banks  once  not  far  from  the  sea -shore.  They  pass  through  the  State, 
half-way  between  the  ocean  and  the  Blue  Ridge,  and  are  most  thoroughly  devel- 
oped near  Aiken,  Columbia,  Camden,  and  Cheraw.  They  are  usually  clothed 
in  aromatic  pine  forests. 

Down  the  slopes,  in  Georgia  and  South  Carolina,  run  rivers,  which  in  winter 
and  spring  are  turbid  with  the  washings  from  the  red  clay  hills  to  the  north- 
ward; and  in  the  fiat  valleys  scattered  along  these  streams  cotton  and  corn 
grow  with  remarkable  luxuriance.  In  Georgia  the  hills  run  from  the  falls  of  the 
Savannah  river  at  Augusta,  south-west  and  north-east,  as  far  as  the  Ogeechee 
river.  The  highest  point  in  this  curious  range,  at  the  United  States  Arsenal 
at  Summerville,  near  Augusta,  is  hardly  more  than  six  hundred  feet  above  the 
sea-level.  The  sand-hills  are  the  home  of  the  yellow  and  the  "  short-leaved  " 
pine,  the  Spanish  and  water  oak,  the  red  maple,  the  sweet  gum,  the  haw,  the 
persimmon,  the  wild  orange,  and  the  China-tree;  the  lovely  Kalmia  Latifolia 
clothes  the  acclivities  each  spring  in  garments  of  pink  and  white;  the  flaming 
azalea,  the  honey-suckle,  the  white  locust,  the  China  burr  and  other  evergreens, 
the  iris,  the  phlox,  the  silk  grass,  flourish  there. 

In  the  open  air,  in  the  gardens,  japonicas  grow  ten  feet  high  and  blossom  late 
in  winter;  and  the  "  fringe  -  tree  "  and  the  Lagerstremia  Indica  dot  the  lawns 
with  a  dense  array  of  blossoms.  Although  the  unstimulated  surface  soil  of  all 
this  section  will  not  produce  cotton  and  the  cereals  more  than  two  years  in 
succession,  yet  it  is  prolific  of  the  peach,  the  apricot,  the  pomegranate,  the  fig, 
the  pear,  all  kinds  of  berries,  and  the  grape,  which  grows  there  with  surprising 
luxuriance;  and  all  vegetables  practicable  in  a  northern  climate  ripen  there  in  the 
months  of  April  and  May. 

A  pleasant  land,  one  is  forced  to  declare.  But  this  productiveness  is  the 
least  of  its  advantages.  '  The  kindly  climate  is  the  chief  glory  of  the  sand-hill 
country.  Aiken  has  achieved  a  great  reputation  as  a  winter  residence  for 
pulmonary  invalids.  The  mild  and  equable  temperature,  and  the  dryness  of  the 
air,  which  allows  the  patient  to  pass  most  of  his  winter  under  the  open  sky, 
inhaling  the  fragrance  of  the  pine  woods,  have,  year  after  year,  drawn  hundreds 
of  exhausted  Northerners  thither.  Before  the  war,  the  planter  of  the  lowlands, 
and  the  merchants  of  New  York  and  Boston  alike,  went  to  Aiken  to  recuperate ; 
the  planter  occupying  a  pleasant  cottage  during  the  summer,  and  the  Northerner 
arriving  with  the  first  hint  of  winter.  But  now  the  planter  comes  no  more  with 
the  splendor  and  spendthrift  profusion  of  old,  and  the  Northerner  has  the  little 
town  very  much  to  himself. 

The  accommodations  have,  for  several  years  since  the  war,  been  insufficient ; 
but  as  the  inhabitants  creep  back  toward  their  old  prosperity,  they  are  giving 
Aiken  the  bright  appearance  of  a  Northern  town,  and  the  ill-looking,  unpainted, 
rickety  houses  of  the  past  are  disappearing.  Originally  laid  out  by  a  railroad 
company,  in  1833,  as  a  future  station  of  commercial  importance,  Aiken  prospered 
until  fire  swallowed  it  up  a  few  years  later.     When  the  war  came,  great  numbers 


346  "SAND-HILLERS" — MANUFACTURES. 

of  refugees  rushed  into  it,  and  the  misery  and  distress  there  were  great.  The 
tide  of  battle  never  swept  through  the  town,  Kilpatrick  contenting  himself  with 
a  partially  successful  raid  in  that  direction  when  Sherman  was  on  the  road  to 
Columbia;  and  as  soon  as  peace  was  declared  the  invalids  flocked  back  again 
to  haunt  the  springs  and  the  pleasant  woody  paths,  over  which  the  jessamine 
day  and  night  showers  its  delicious  fragrance. 

Aiken  is  situated  seventeen  miles  from  the  Savannah  river  and  from  Augusta, 
on  the  South  Carolina  railroad,  which  extends  southward  to  Charleston.  The 
inhabitants  of  the  hill-country,  a  little  remote  from  the  towns,  are  decidedly 
primitive  in  their  habits,  and  the  sobriquet  of  "  sand-hiller  "  is  applied  by  South 
Carolinians  to  specimens  of  poor  white  trash,  which  nothing  but  a  system  of 
slave-aristocracy  could  ever  have  produced.  The  lean  and  scrawny  women, 
without  animation,  their  faces  discolored  by  illness,  and  the  lank  and  'hungry 
men,  have  their  counterparts  nowhere  among  native  Americans  at  the  North ; 
it  is  incapable  of  producing  such  a  peasantry. 

The  houses  of  the.  better  class  of  this  folk, — the  prosperous  farmers,  as  dis- 
tinguished from  the  lazy  and  dissolute  plebeians, — to  whom  the  word  "sand- 
hiller"  is  perhaps  too  indiscriminately  given,  are  loosely  built,  as  the  climate 
demands  little  more  than  shelter.  At  night,  immense  logs  burn  in  the  fireplace, 
while  the  house  door  remains  open.  The  diet  is  barbarous  as  elsewhere 
among  the  agricultural  classes  in  the  South  —  corn-bread,  pork  and  "chick'n;" 
farmers  rarely  killing  a  cow  for  beef,  or  a  sheep  for  mutton.  Hot  and  bitter 
coffee  smokes  morning  and  night  on  the  tables  where  purest  spring  water, 
or  best  of  Scuppernong  wine,  might  be  daily  placed — the  latter  with  almost  as 
little  expense  as  the  former. 

But  the  invalid  visiting  this  region  in  search  of  health,  and  frequenting  a 
town  of  reasonable  size,  encounters  none  of  these  miseries.  At  Augusta  and 
at  Aiken  he  can  secure  the  comforts  to  which  he  is  accustomed  in  the  North, 
to  which  will  be  added  a  climate  in  which  existence  is  a  veritable  joy.  In 
the  vicinity  of  Aiken  many  hundreds  of  acres  are  now  planted  with  the  grape ; 
and  2,500  gallons  of  wine  to  the  acre  have  been  guaranteed  in  some  cases, 
although  the  average  production  must,  of  course,  fall  very  much  below  that. 

The  development  of  the  resources  for  manufacturing  in  the  region  extending 
between  and  including  Aiken  and  Augusta  merits  especial  mention,  and  shows 
what  may  be  done  by  judicious  enterprise  in  the  South.  The  extensive  cotton 
manufactories  at  Augusta  and  Graniteville  employ  many  hundreds  of  hands. 
Scarcely  a  quarter  of  a  century  ago  the  Augusta  cotton  manufacturing  enterprise 
was  inaugurated  with  but  a  small  capital.  It  was  the  outgrowth  of  a  demand 
for  labor  for  the  surplus  white  population — labor  whose  results  should  accrue  at 
once  to  the  benefit  of  the  State,  and  of  that  population.  In  due  time  the  canal  at 
Augusta  was  constructed. 

The  Augusta  cotton  factory,  which  was  not  at  first  prosperous,  now  has  a 
capital  stock  of  $600,000,  upon  which  a  quarterly  dividend  of  five  per  cent,  is 
paid.  Thousands  of  spindles  and  hundreds  of  looms  are  now  busy  along  the 
banks  of  the    noble    canal,    where,  also,    have   sprung    up  fine    flour-mills  and 


ALONG     THE     SAVANNAH     RIVER AUGUSTA, 


347 


tobacco  factories.  The  cotton-mill  is  filled  with  the  newest  and  finest  machinery, 
and  has  received  the  high  compliment,  from  Senator  Sprague,  of  Rhode  Island, 
of  being  "the  best  arranged  one  in  the  United  States." 

At  Graniteville,  in  South  Carolina,  two  or  three  miles  beyond  the  Savannah 
river,  extensive  mills  have  also  been  erected,  and  eight  million  yards  of  cotton 
are  annually  made  there.  The  manufacturing  village  is  as  tidy  and  thrifty  as  any 
in  the  North,  and  there  is  none  in  the  South  which  excels  it  in  a  general  aspect 
of  comfort,  unless    it   be    that    of  the 

Eagle  and  Phoenix  Company  at  Colum-  -  J:~'  T 

bus,  Georgia.     Six  miles  from  Augusta 
there  is  an    extensive    kaolin    factory. 

Early  on  a  bright  summer  morn- 
ing, while  the  inhabitants  were  still 
asleep,  I  entered  Augusta,  and  walked 
through  the  broad,  beautifully  shaded 
avenues  of  this  lovely  Southern  city. 
The  birds  gossiped  languidly  in  the 
dense  foliage,  through  which  the  sun 
was  just  peering;  here  and  there  the 
sand  of  the  streets  was  mottled  with 
delicate  light  and  shade ;  the  omni- 
present negro  was  fawning  and  yawning 
on  door-steps,  abandoning  himself  to 
his  favorite  attitude  of  slouch. 

I  wandered  to  the  banks  of  the 
Savannah,    which  sweeps,   in    a  broad 

and      Sluggish      Current,      between      high  A  Bell-Tower  in  Augusta,  Georgia. 

banks,  bordered  at  intervals  with  enormous  mulberry  trees.  Clambering  down 
among  the  giant  boles  of  these  sylvan  monarchs,  and  stumbling  from  time 
to  time  over  a  somnolent  negro  fisherman,  I  could  see  the  broad  and  fertile 
Carolina  fields  opposite,  and  scent  the  perfume  which  the  slight  breeze  sent  from 
the  dense  masses  of  trees  in  the  town  above  me. 

Returning,  an  hour  later,  I  found  the  place  had  awakened  to  a  life  and 
energy  worthy  of  the  brightest  of  Northern  cities  of  its  size.  The  superb 
Greene  street,  with  its  grand  double  rows  of  shade  trees,  whose  broad  boughs 
almost  interlocked  above,  was  filled  with  active  pedestrians ;  the  noise  of  wagons 
and  drays  was  beginning;  the  cheery  markets  were  thronged  with  gossiping 
negro  women ;  and  around  the  Cotton  Exchange  groups  were  already  gathered 
busily  discussing  the  previous  day's  receipts. 

Augusta's  excellent  railroad  facilities,  and  her  advantageous  situation,  have 
made  her  an  extensive  cotton  market.  The  Georgia  railroad  is  largely  tributary 
to  the  town,  although  Savannah  is  of  late  years  receiving  much  of  the  cotton 
which  properly  belongs  to  Augusta.  The  new  railway  stretching  from  Port 
Royal,  in  South  Carolina,  to  Augusta,  furnishes  a  convenient  outlet,  and  the  South 
Carolina  and  Central  roads  give  communication  with  Charleston  and  Savannah. 


348 


CHANGES     IN     COTTON-PLANTING. 


The  Cotton  Exchange  was  founded  in  1872.  For  the  cotton  years  of  1872- 
73,  Augusta  received  180,789  bales.  The  cotton  factories  in  the  city  consume 
200  bales  daily,  and  the  Langley  and  the  Hickman  factories  in  South  Carolina, 
and  the  Richmond  mills  in  Georgia,  are  also  supplied  from  this  point. 
Cotton  culture  throughout  ail  this  section  has  greatly  increased  since  the 
war.  I  was  told  that  one  man  in  Jackson  county  now  grows  a  larger  number  of 
bales  than  the  whole  county  produced  previous  to  i860. 

The  use  of  fertilizers,  once  so  utterly  discarded,  is  now  producing  the  most 
remarkable  results.  But  the  planters  in  all  the  surrounding  country  give  but 
little  attention  to  a  rotation  or  diversity  of  crops,  so  that  any  year's  failure  of 
the  cotton  brings  them  to  financial  distress,  as  they  depend  entirely  upon  the 
outer  world  for  their  supplies ;  although,  in  some  of  the  northern  sections  of 
the  State  they  show  an  inclination  to  vary  their  course  in  this  respect.  Conver- 
sation with  representative  men  from  various  parts  of  the  State,  who  naturally 
flock  into  Augusta  to  inspect  the  market,  showed,  however,  that  there  was  a 
steady  and  genuine  improvement  in  agriculture  throughout  Georgia.  Lands 
which  heretofore  have  been  considered  of  superior  quality  for  cotton-growing 
have,  under  the  new  regime,  with  careful  fertilizing  and  culture,  produced  twice 
as  much  as  during  the  epoch  of  slavery. 

According  to  universal  testimony,  the  negro  on  these  cotton-lands  usually 
works  well,  "  and  when  he  does  not,"  said  a  planter  to  me,  "  it  is  because  he  is 
poorly  paid."  Small  farms  seem  to  be  increasing  in  Middle  Georgia,  and  much 
of  the  cotton  brought  into  Augusta  is  raised  exclusively  by  white  labor.  The 
small  farmers,  who  were  before  the  war  unable  to  produce  a  crop  in  competition 
with  those  who  possessed  a  larger  number  of  slaves,  now  find  no  difficulty  in 
placing  their  crop  in  market,  and  securing  good  prices  for  it. 

Augusta,  like  Savannah,  is  a  town  built  in  the  midst  of  a  beautiful  wood. 
The  public  buildings  are  embowered  in  foliage;  the  pretty  City  Hall,  the  Medical 
College,  the   Masonic  and  Odd  Fellows'  Halls  peering  out  from  knots  of  trees. 

Broad  street,  the  main  thor- 
oughfare, is  well  lined  with 
commodious  stores  and  resi- 
dences, and  the  streets  lead- 
ing from  it  are  well  kept  and 
shaded.  In  front  of  the  City 
Hall  stands  a  simple  but 
massive  monument,  erected 
to  the  memory  of  the 
Georgian  signers  of  the 
Declaration  of  American 
Independence. 

Tall  men,  as  well  as  tall 

A  Confederate  Soldier's  Grave  at  Augusta,  Georgia      [Page  349.]  and  graceful  trees,  abound  in 

the  streets,  for  the  Georgian  is  dowered  with  a  generous  height.     The  policemen 
are  clad  in  an  amicable  mingling  of  gray  and  blue.     On  the  road  to  Summerville, 


CONFEDERATE     GRAVES.  349 

the  pretty  suburb  on  one  of  the  sand-hills  three  miles  away,  one  sees  the  powder- 
mill,  now  disused,  which  supplied  the  Confederates  with  ammunition  for  many  a 
day ;  and  in  a  lovely  location,  at  the  hill's  top,  is  the  extensive  United  States 
Arsenal,  around  which  are  grouped  many  workshops,  built  and  occupied  by  the 
Confederates  during  the  war. 

Nothing  can  exceed  in  quiet  and  reverent  beauty  the  floral  decoration  of  the 
principal  cemetery  of  Augusta.  Loving  hands  have  lingered  long  over  the  Con- 
federate soldiers'  graves,  and  the  white  headstones,  neatly  surrounded  with  box- 
wood hedges,  nearly  all  bear  inscriptions  like  the  following,  which  show  that 
even  as  in  the  North,  the  young  were  the  first  to  go,  and  first  to  fall : 

"Joe  E.  R , 

Co.  E.,  4  Term.  Cav. 

Died  Feb.   17,  1863, 

Aged  19." 

Here  and  there  tall  posts  have  decorative  mottoes  worked  in  evergreen  upon 

them,  such  as 

"The  Sacred  Trust  of  Heroes." 
"Our  Boys  in  Grey." 

Augusta  escaped  the  scourge  of  Invasion,  but  did  not  escape  the  ghost  of 
Bereavement,  who  has  claimed  such  a  large  space  among  the  pleasant  shadows 
for  his  own  particular  ground. 

The  old  town  had  a  stormy  revolutionary  history.  Named  after  one  of  the 
royal  princesses  of  England  by  Oglethorpe,  it  was  an  Indian  outpost  after  1735, 
and  in  constant  danger  from  the  savages,  until  taken  and  retaken  by  Briton  and 
American  during  the  revolution.  The  churches  and  the  institutions  of  learning 
in  Augusta  are  numerous,  and  the  extensive  fair-ground  of  the  Cotton  States' 
Mechanical  and  Agricultural  Association  occupies  many  pleasant  acres  just 
outside  the  eastern  limits  of  the  city. 


23 


XXXVII. 

ATLANTA  —  GEORGIA     POLITICS — THE     FAILURE     OF 
RECONSTRUCTION. 

FROM  the  ashes  of  the  great  penitential  conflagration  in  which  the  exigen- 
cies of  war  enveloped  Atlanta,  from  the  ruins  of  the  thousand  dwellings, 
factories,  workshops,  and  railroad  establishments  totally  destroyed  in  the  blaze  of 
1864,  has  sprung  up  a  new,  vigorous,  awkwardly  alert  city,  very  similar  in 
character  to  the  mammoth  groupings  of  brick  and  stone  in  the  North-west. 
There  is  but  little  that  is  distinctively  Southern  in  Atlanta ;  it  is  the  antithesis  of 
Savannah.  There  is  nothing  that  reminds  one  of  the  North  in  the  deliriously 
embowered  chief  city  of  Georgia,  surrounded  with  its  romantic  moss-hung  oaks, 
its  rich  lowlands,  and  its  luxuriant  gardens,  where  the  magnolia,  the  bay,  and  the 
palmetto  vie  with  one  another  in  the  exquisite  inexplicable  charm  of  their  volup- 
tuous beauty.  Atlanta  has  an  unfinished  air ;  its  business  and  residence  streets 
are  scattered  along  a  range  of  pretty  hills ;  but  it  is  eminently  modern  and 
unromantic.     The   Western   and   Atlantic   railway    unites   it  with   Chattanooga, 


Sunset  over  Atlanta,  Georgia. 

running  through  a  country  which  was  scourged  in  bitterest  fashion  by  the  war; 
the  Georgia  railroad  connects  it  with  Augusta;  the  Macon  and  Western  with 
handsome  and  thriving  Macon ;  the  Atlanta  and  WTest  Point  road  to  the  town  of 
West  Point,  Alabama,   gives  a  continuous  line    to  Montgomery ;    and  the  new 


A      REVIEW      OF      GEORGIAN      POLITICS.  351 

Piedmont  Air  Line,  which  has  opened  up  the  whole  of  Northern  Georgia,  gives 
it  new  and  speedy  communication  with  the  North  via  Charlotte,  in  North  Caro- 
lina. Great  numbers  of  Northern  people  have  flocked  to  Atlanta  to  live  since 
the  time  when  General  Pope's  will  was  law,  and  when  the  Bullock  administration 
was  just  arising  out  of  the  chaos  of  the  constitutional  convention.  The  removal 
of  the  State  capital  from  Milledgeville  to  Atlanta  also  gave  the  renaissant  city  a 
good  start,  and  the  wonderful  manner  in  which  it  drew  trade  and  capital  to  it 
from  all  sides  made  it  the  envy  of  its  sister  Georgian  cities. 

A  brief  review  of  the  progress  of  politics  in  the  State  since  Atlanta  became 
its  capital  will  aid  in  arriving  at  an  understanding  of  the  present  social  and  politi- 
cal condition  of  the  commonwealth. 

When  the  reconstruction  policy  of  the  General  Government  began,  a  large 
number  of  the  citizens  of  Georgia  declared  for  it,  and  among  them  was  Mr.  Bul- 
lock, subsequently  Governor  of  the  State.  In  the  political  campaign  which 
ensued,  the  opposite  faction,  which  totally  repudiated  the  reconstruction  acts, 
condescended  to  much  proscription  and  denunciation,  and  numbers  of  Union 
men  were  driven  from  the  State.  It  was  out  of  this  campaign  that  the  Ku-Klux 
conspiracy,  as  manifested  in  Georgia,  is  supposed  to  have  grown.  Prominent 
Republicans  received  lugubrious  letters  containing  pictures  of  coffins,  and  acts  of 
violence  were  not  wanting.  Native  Georgians,  who  were  leading  Republican 
officials,  were  hunted  down  and  assassinated ;  Republican  meetings  were  dis- 
persed, not  without  slaughter;  and  it  was  manifest  from  the  outset  that  there 
was  to  be  a  decided  upsetting  of  the  attempt  to  enforce  the  policy  inaugurated 
by  the  war.  But  the  Republican  party  was  organized,  and  its  Legislature,  in 
which  there  were  many  negroes,  went  into  session. 

The  first  trouble  that  occurred  was  due  to  a  discussion  of  the  question 
whether  or  not  men  who  had  held  office  previous  to  the  war,  and  then  had  taken 
part  in  the  rebellion,  were  eligible  for  the  Legislature.  The  debate  upon  this 
matter  was  heated  and  angry,  and  the  final  decision  was  in  favor  of  extreme 
liberality  toward  all  who  had  fought  on  the  Confederate  side.  Many  of  these 
were  admitted  to  the  State  councils,  and  after  a  time,  getting  control  of  the 
middle-men,  they  had  the  Legislature  in  their  hands.  Their  first  act  was  to  oust 
all  the  colored  members — some  thirty-six — and  to  proceed  on  the,basis  that  a 
white  man's  government  was  the  only  one  for  Georgia.  The  expulsion  of  the 
negroes  was  corrected  by  act  of  Congress ;  and  in  1 869  the  colored  element  was 
readmitted  to  the  Legislature.  After  this,  Bullock,  who  was  the  first  Governor 
chosen  under  the  operation  of  the  reconstruction  laws,  had  full  sway  for  about 
two  years.  Some  good  laws  were  passed  during  that  time,  but  the  railroad 
legislation  was  the  occasion  of  veritable  disaster  to  the  progress  of  reconstruction 
in  Georgia.  Bullock  was  in  due  time  compelled  to  depart  from  the  State,  to  save 
himself  from  imprisonment ;  and  the  Democratic  party,  completely  triumphant, 
now  and  then  announces  its  convictions  through  the  medium  of  Robert  Toombs, 
who  has  been  its  leader,  and,  in  some  measure,  its  exponent  for  many  years.  It 
is  not  long  since  this  gentleman,  in  a  speech  made  at  Atlanta  in  favor  of  a 
convention  to  revise  the  constitution  of  the   State,   made   use   of  the   following 


352  GOVERNOR     BULLOCK. 

language  :  "  Why,  look  at  that  miserable  thing  you  call  a  constitution  !  It  com- 
mits you  to  all  the  lies  of  the  revolution  against  you.  It  says  your  allegiance 
is  first  due  to  the  Federal  Government  before  it  is  due  to  your  own  State  ?  Do 
you  believe  that  ?     When  you  can  wrench  that  from  the  constitution,  do  it ! " 

Under  the  administration  of  Governor  Bullock,  a  system  of  internal  improve- 
ment was  inaugurated,  theoretically  granting  State  aid  to  naissant  railroads  in 
the  proportion  in  which  the  companies  building  those  roads  aided  themselves. 
But  bonds  were  over-issued,  and  were  negotiated  by  prominent  bankers  in  New 
York  city.  The  Brunswick  and  Albany  railroad  was  the  principal  project. 
About  $6,000,000  worth  of  bonds  were  actually  issued  during  the  two  years,  all 
of  which  went  to  the  Brunswick  and  Albany  railroad,  with  the  exception  of 
$600,000  granted  to  the  Cartersville  and  Van  West  road.  The  party  now  in 
power  has  repudiated  all  the  railroad  bonds  issued  under  Bullock's  regime.  The 
New  York  bankers  have  not  suffered  very  much  by  this,  but  the  repudiation  will 
give  the  credit  of  the  State  a  severe  blow. 

The  Governor,  during  these  two  years  in  which  the  reconstruction  policy  of 
Congress  was  upheld,  seems  to  have  had  an  agitated  and  miserable  existence.  He 
spent  a  great  deal  of  time  and  money  in  Washington  before  he  succeeded  in  pro- 
curing the  legislation  which  restored  the  negroes  to  their  places  in  the  Legislature 
in  1869.  It  is  alleged  that  when  he  took  the  reins  of  government  in  Georgia  he 
was  worth  no  money,  but  that,  a  little  time  after  he  had  assumed  the  office,  he 
paid  his  debts,  and  became  reasonably  prosperous.  But  he  was  surrounded  by 
an  atmosphere  of  corruption,  and  it  is  difficult  to  say  that  he  was  individually 
dishonest.  In  his  defense,  which  gives  a  very  clear  idea  of  the  immense  obsta- 
cles which  wily  and  subtle  men  placed  in  his  path,  it  is  evident  that  he  required 
the  shrewdness  of  an  archangel  to  march  without  stumbling.  It  was  for  the 
interest  of  the  Democratic  party  in  the  State  to  make  reconstruction  unsuccess- 
ful, and  toward  that  end  they  unceasingly  toiled. 

The  material  on  which  one  was  compelled  to  work,  to  maintain  the  power  of 
the  reconstruction  government  in  those  days,  was  unreliable.  One  never  knew 
when  he  was  to  be  betrayed  by  the  weak-kneed  or  ignorant  legislators  who  were 
his  own  friends.  Prominent  State  officials  were  applied  to  to  contribute  money 
for  "  election  purposes," — i.  e.,  for  the  purchase  of  votes.  I  was  told  by  those 
who  did  not  fear  sincere  contradiction,  that  as  much  as  two  thousand  dollars  was 
sometimes  paid  at  that  epoch  for  a  single  vote.  Often  in  danger  of  losing  his 
life,  and  always  in  danger  of  betrayal,  the  head  of  the  newly  organized  party  was 
haunted  by  horrors. 

The  career  of  H.  I.  Kimball  in  Atlanta,  and  in  various  enterprises  in  the 
commonwealth,  has  not  a  little  to  do  with  the  present  condition  of  politics  in 
Georgia.  In  1865,  Mr.  Kimball  made  his  appearance  in  the  State,  and  began 
by  perfecting  arrangements  for  placing  sleeping-cars  on  all  the  roads  in  the 
South.  Atlanta  was  even  then  peering  from  beneath  the  ashes  under  which  she 
had  been  buried,  and  was  vaguely  whispering  prophecies  of  her  future  commer- 
cial greatness.  The  capital  was  likely  to  be  removed  from  Milledgeville  to  that 
city  as  soon  as  a  regular  State  government  should  be  resumed,  and  Kimball, 


H.      I.      KIMBALL  —  THE     OPERA     HOUSE. 


353 


The    State- House  —  Atlanta,  Georgia. 


doubtless,   saw  that  as   readily  as   did   any  of  the  Atlantians.     The  Kimball- 
Ramsey- Pullman  Sleeping- Car  Company  was  the  name  of  the  organization  with 
which  he  started  ;  and  he  intended,  it  is  said,  to  get  rich  out  of  it  by  means  of 
$300,000  franchise  stock,  which  he  was  to  have.     This  venture  was  not  success- 
ful, and  many  people  who  furnished  the  money  to  buy  the  necessary  cars  were 
sufferers.     His  next  venture  was  the   "Atlanta  Opera   House."     The   original 
company  which  had  contemplated  erect- 
ing a  mammoth  block  for  an  opera  house,  1  4 
and  for   stores    and   public    offices,  had                   ^     H    I  ? 
failed ;  the  unfinished  building  was  con- 
sidered worth  $115,000,  but  Mr.  Kim- 
ball obtained  possession  of  it  for  $33,000. 
This  purchase  gave  him  the  means  of 
raising   money;    he  finished  the   Opera 
House,  furnishing  it  as  a  legislative  edi- 
fice.    At  that  time  the  Legislature  was 
in  session  in  the  City  Hall  in  Atlanta. 
The  city  rented  Kimball's  new  building, 
as  soon  as  it  was  completed,  for  a  State- 
House.     Kimball  had  fitted  it  up  with 
$55,000,   advanced    to    him,    it    is    said, 
by    Governor   Bullock    from    the    State 
funds.     The  Legislature  entered  the  new  Capitol,  and  no  sooner  had  they  assem- 
bled than   Mr.   Kimball  besought  them  to  buy  it.     They  at  first  refused,  but 
subsequently  purchased  it  for  $300,000.      As  soon  as  this  was  decided  on,  the 
$55,000    loaned  by  the  Governor  to  Kimball  were  returned,  thus  presumably 
securing  Governor  Bullock  from  impeachment. 

Having  prospered  so  well  in  the  Opera  House  project,  the  ingenious  Kimball 
conceived  the  scheme  of  the  Kimball  House,  at  present  the  largest  hotel 
in  Atlanta,  and  one  of  the  largest  in  the  Southern  States.  A  bill  was  passed  by 
the  Legislature  allowing  an  advance  to  the  Brunswick  and  Albany  railroad — 
that  is  to  say,  two  acts  allowed  Kimball,  who  was  the  contractor,  to  build  the 
road,  to  draw  respectively  $12,000  and  $15,000  per  mile,  before  building  each 
section  of  twenty  miles.  By  this  issue  he  obtained  the  funds  with  which  to  build 
the  Kimball  House.  He  constructed  the  first  twenty  miles  of  the  Brunswick 
and  Albany  railroad  in  good  faith,  then  gradually  encroached,  until  there  was  no 
longer  any  semblance  of  adherence  to  the  letter  of  the  act,  which  naturally 
required  him  to  build  the  road  as  fast  as  the  money  was  advanced.  Meantime 
the  Democrats  were  vigorously  attacking  Governor  Bullock,  charging  him  with 
every  kind  of  theft,  and  he  was  in  a  precarious  situation,  when  he  suddenly  found 
that  he  had  not  a  majority  that  he  could  count  on  in  the  Legislature.  Then 
ensued  a  severe  struggle  on  his  part  against  the  ousting  which  was  threatened. 
Kimball  continued  to  unfold  superb  schemes,  and  turn  them  to  his  private 
account.  In  the  fall  of  1871,  Governor  Bullock  paid  a  visit  to  California, 
whence  he  was  hurried  home  by  the  announcement  that  the  Legislature  was  to 


354  THE     FAILURE     OF     RECONSTRUCTION      IN     GEORGIA. 

meet  in  December.  He  returned ;  surveyed  the  political  field ;  found  that  he 
was  in  imminent  danger  of  being  complicated  and  possibly  impeached,  and  went 
North  and  resigned.  Shortly  after,  Kimball  disappeared  from  Atlanta  and  from 
his  Southern  field  of  operations,  and  the  bubble  burst. 

The  State  railroad,  running  from  Atlanta  northward  to  Chattanooga,  had 
been  leased  under  Bullock's  administration.  The  Democrats,  who  now  came  into 
power,  charged  that  the  Governor  was  guilty  of  gross  official  misconduct  in 
leasing  the  road,  although  it  was  done  in  obedience  to  an  act  of  the  Legislature, 
and  they  proceeded  to  prosecute  every  one  who  had  been  connected  with  the 
management  of  it  under  the  Bullock  regime.  They  based  their  charge  against 
the  Governor  upon  the  theory  that  he  was  personally  and  pecuniarily  interested 
in  the  road,  as  Kimball  was  one  of  the  lessees,  and  the  Governor  was  alleged  to 
be  Kimball's  partner.  This,  however,  the  Governor  expressly  denies,  showing 
that  the  road,  which,  for  the  twenty  years  from  its  building  up  to  1868,  had  been 
an  expense  to  the  State,  and  a  fruitful  source  of  political  corruption,  was  made 
profitable  under  the  lease  system.  The  prosecutions  by  the  Democratic  party 
were  characterized  by  a  great  deal  of  acerbity,  and  in  one  case  the  Supreme 
Court  decided  that  much  injustice  was  inflicted  upon  a  prosecuted  party.  The 
Democratic  Legislative  Committee  appointed  to  investigate  the  official  conduct 
of  the  late  Governor  was  in  session  seven  months,  and  confined  its  final  report 
mainly  to  denunciations  of  the  Governor's  course,  on  the  supposition  that  he  was 
Kimball's  partner.  They  took  complete  control  of  the  State  Government, 
gloried  in  the  repudiation  of  the  various  bonds  issued  from  1869  to  1 871,  and 
maintained  that  the  reconstruction  acts  of  Congress  were  "  unconstitutional, 
revolutionary,  null,  and  void." 

Certainly  reconstruction  is  null  and  void  in  Georgia.  It  has  been  a  complete 
failure  there.  That  there  have  been  instances  of  glaring  injustice  practiced  on 
both  sides  no  fair-minded  man  can  for  an  instant  doubt.  The  Republican  admin- 
istration lasted  scarcely  three  years ;  and  the  legitimate  results  of  the  war  were  not 
maintained  so  long  as  that  after  1868.  Out  of  the  90,000  colored  voters  in  the 
State,  scarcely  30,000  vote  to-day ;  free  schools  are  almost  unknown  outside  the 
large  cities  and  towns ;  and  there  has  not  been  a  Republican  inspector  of  election 
since  the  Democrats  assumed  power.  To  judge  from  the  testimony  of  native 
Georgians  who  are  Republicans,  and  who  have  never  been  suspected  of  any 
dishonesty  or  untruth,  the  negroes  are  very  grossly  intimidated;  and  the  Ku-Klux 
faction  still  exists  as  a  kind  of  invisible  empire.  This  is  naturally  to  be  expected 
after  the  occurrences  in  Louisiana,  South  Carolina,  and  Alabama ;  it  is  the  revul- 
sion from  tyrannical  ignorance  and  carpet -baggery;  and  may  prove  as  baneful  in 
its  results  as  has  its  degraded  and  disreputable  opposite.  The  Democrat  of 
Georgia  talks  with  all  the  more  emphasis  of  a  white  man's  government  in  his 
commonwealth,  because  he  feels  that  there  is  a  black  man's  government  in 
a  neighboring  State ;  if  he  has  ever  had  any  exaggerated  fears  as  to  a  too  free 
assumption  of  civil  rights  by  his  ex-slave,  those  fears  are  accented  ten-fold 
since  he  has  seen  the  real  injustice  practiced  by  negroes  where  they  have 
attained  supreme,  unrestricted  power. 


MILITARY     DRILL FREE      SCHOOLS.  355 

Both  the  whites  and  blacks  in  the  State  have  large  and  effective  military 
organizations,  and  drill  constantly,  as  if  dumbly  preparing  for  some  possible 
future  strife.  The  battalions  of  the  white  race  still  cling  to  the  Confederate 
gray,  in  some  cases ;  the  negro  militiaman  blossoms  into  a  variety  of  gorgeous 
uniforms.  I  saw  a  company  of  blacks  assembling  in  Atlanta ;  they  were  good- 
looking,  stalwart  men,  and  went  about  their  work  with  the  utmost  nonchalance, 
while  here  and  there  a  white  muttered  between  his  teeth  something  unmis- 
takably like   "  d n   niggers."     There    is   a    very    large    negro   population   in 

Atlanta  and  the   surrounding  country. 

But  few  traces  of  the  war  are  now  left  in  Atlanta.  The  residence  streets 
have  a  smart,  new  air;  many  fine  houses  have  been  recently  built,  and  their 
Northern  architecture  and  trim  gardens  afford  a  pleasant  surprise  after  the 
tumble-down,  unpainted  towns  of  which  one  sees  so  many  in  the  South.  The 
banks,  the  theatres,  the  public  business  blocks,  the  immense  Kimball  House,  all 
have  the  same  canny  air — seem  to  be  boasting  of  their  tidy  looks  and  prosperity 
to  the  countrymen  who  come  into  town  to  market.  I  strolled  into  the  Capitol 
(the  quondam  Opera  House,  which  Kimball  sold  the  Legislature).  In  the  office 
of  the  State  Treasurer  I  encountered  some  gentlemen  who  seemed  inclined 
to  believe  that  the  State  would  not  suffer  if  all  debts  contracted  under  the  Bul- 
lock regime  were  repudiated.  One  said  that  he  could  not  inform  me  how  much 
the  State  debt,  as  construed  by  the  reconstructionists,  was ;  he  reckoned  no  one 
knew ;  the  scoundrels  who  had  contracted  the  debt  had  run  away ;  if  they  could 
lay  hands  on  Bullock  they  would  put  him  in  the  penitentiary.  I  found,  every- 
where I  went  in  the  Capitol,  a  spirit  of  extreme  bitterness  prevailing  against  the 
departed  carpet-baggers ;  and  all  complained  that  the  State  affairs  had  been  left 
in  a  wretched  condition. 

The  attempt  to  establish  free  common  schools  throughout  Georgia  has  thus 
far  resulted  in  failure.  Prior  to  the  war  there  was  but  little  effort  made  for  the 
education  of  the  masses.  A  small  sum  was  appropriated  as  the  "  indigent  school 
fund,"  but  the  majority  of  the  poorer  classes  in  the  back-country  remained  in 
dense  ignorance.  In  the  present  State  School  Commissioner's  office  I  was 
informed  that  there  had  been  no  common  school  open  outside  the  large  cities  for 
some  time.  It  was  alleged  that  the  school  fund  had  been  diverted  to  unlawful 
purposes  during  the  "  previous  administration,"  and  that  the  State  had  been 
much  embarrassed  by  a  debt  of  $300,000,  incurred  in  prematurely  putting 
schools  into  operation.  There  seems  no  doubt  of  a  sincere  desire  on  the  part  of 
the  Georgia  Conservatives  to  maintain  free  schools ;  and  it  is,  by  the  way,  note- 
worthy that  three  of  the  Southern  States  that  are  Conservative  in  politics  are 
leading  all  the  others  in  education.  Local  taxation  is  the  principal  bugbear. 
The  farmer  dislikes  to  be  taxed  for  schools  ;  he  still  has  various  absurd  pre- 
judices ;  thinks  the  common  school  a  pauper  institution,  and  gets  angry  if  there 
is  any  talk  of  compulsory  education.  The  school  population  of  the  State  is  about 
370,000,  and  the  annual  school  revenue,  derived  from  interest  on  bonds,  from  the 
poll  tax,  from  taxes  on  shows,  and  from  dividends  on  railroad  stock,  amounts  to 
$280,000.      This   is,  of  course,  ridiculously  small,   and,  now  that  Georgia  has 


356  MANUFACTURES  OF  ATLANTA. 

arrived  once  more  at  some  degree  of  material  prosperity,  will,  doubtless,  be 
increased,  and  amends  will  be  made  for  the  shameful  negligence  which  allowed 
the  whole  school  machinery  to  stop  and  rust  for  a  year.  A  praiseworthy  but 
fruitless  effort  has  recently  been  made  in  the  Legislature  to  follow  in  the  steps  of 
Tennessee,  by  favoring  local  taxation,  a  limit  to  the  amount  of  which  is  to  be 
fixed,  to  guard  against  the  creation  of  excessive  taxes  by  negro  votes ;  and  the 
Peabody  fund  is  employed  in  aiding  the  proselyters  who  preach  the  cause  of 
common  school  education  in  the  back  counties.  The  illiteracy  in  Georgia 
previous  to  i860  was  alarming;  the  most  moderate  estimates  showed  that 
eighteen  per  cent,  of  the  adult  native  white  population  could  not  even  read ;  and, 
in  i860,  when  the  State  had  a  scholastic  population  of  236,454,  only  94,687 
attended  school.  Prejudice  is  strong,  but  the  free  school  will  establish  itself  in 
Georgia,  as  everywhere  South,-  in  due  time.  I  think  that  the  mass  of  Georgians 
respect  an  educated  negro,  but  are  determined  to  make  him  do  the  work  of 
educating  himself.  The  negro  needs  a  good  general  education,  mainly  because 
it  will  strengthen  his  character,  and  make  him  more  independent.  He  is  at 
present  very  easily  intimidated  with  regard  to  his  voting,  and  readily  falls  into 
corrupt  practices  in  election  time,  because  he  does  not  consider  the  evil  effects 
of  such  a  course. 

The  manufactures  of  Atlanta  are  not  extensive ;  there  are  some  large  rolling- 
mills,  and  a  good  deal  of  iron  is  brought  down  from  the  country  to  the  north- 
ward, and  worked  over  there.  Of  course  there  is  a  large  cotton  movement 
through  the  town ;  and,  in  the  late  autumn,  a  journey  along  the  railroad  to  Chat- 
tanooga discloses  hundreds  of  teams  toiling  over  the  rough  roads,  bringing 
goodly  stores  of  cotton  bales  to  the  stations.  Journalism  in  Atlanta  is  vivacious 
and  enterprising,  and  the  New  Era  and  the  Herald  are  newspapers  of  metropoli- 
tan dimensions.  The  Governor's  residence  is  a  pretty  building,  on  an  ambitious 
avenue,  where  stand  many  handsome  mansions ;  the  City  Hall  is  quite  imposing. 
Atlanta  is  the  home  of  General  John  B.  Gordon,  one  of  the  present  United  States 
senators,  and  a  noted  Confederate  general.  On  the  road  from  Atlanta  to 
Augusta,  and  but  fifteen  miles  from  the  capital,  is  the  remarkable  "  Stone  Mount- 
ain," a  peak  of  solitary  rock,  3,000  feet  in  height,  and  several  miles  in  circum- 
ference. Near  its  top  are  the  remains  of  an  ancient  fortification ;  and  along  the 
sides  there  are  little  patches  of  soil,  but  from  a  distance  the  great  pyramid  stands 
out  seemingly  naked  before  the  sky,  its  dark  gray  looming  up  angrily  against  the 
crystal  vault. 

Northward,  twenty  miles  from  Atlanta,  at  the  base  of  the  Kenesaw  mountain, 
lies  the  pretty  little  town  of  Marietta,  once  the  location  of  a  flourishing  military 
academy,  and  now  a  summer  resort  for  the  well-to-do  of  Atlanta's  30,000 
residents.  The  country  between  Atlanta  and  Chattanooga  seems  as  peaceful  as 
if  never  a  soldier  had  set  his  foot  upon  it ;  yet  it  needs  no  stretch  of  memory  to 
recall  those  wild  days  when  the  giant  strategists,  Sherman  and  Johnston,  bitterly 
fought  and  fortified,  and  marched  and  countermarched  during  long  months,  from 
Dalton  to  the  Chattahoochee  river,  whence  Sherman  pushed  on  against  Hood 
and  the  desperate  Confederate  armies,  whose  command  Hood  had  taken  after  the 


RAILROAD      AND      AGRICULTURAL      ENTERPRISE. 


357 


Richmond  Government's  fatal  error, — the  removal  of  Johnston, —  until  the  great 
granary  and  storehouse  of  the  Confederacy,  with  Atlanta  for  its  centre,  was  con- 
quered by  the  Union  arms.  The  "State,"  or  Western  and  Atlantic  road,  once 
the  object  of  so  many  hostile  cavalry  raids,  does  a  thriving  trade.  At  all  the 
stations,  in  harvest  time,  are  groups  of  jovial  and  contented  agriculturists,  white 
and  black,  their  garments  flecked  with  cotton.  Near  Marietta,  at  Roswell,  there 
are  flourishing  cotton  factories.  Allatoona  and  Resaca,  memorable  for  the  scenes 
of  1864,  lie  in  a  broken,  picturesque  and  fertile  country;  the  lands  along  the 
creeks  are  especially  rich.  Dalton,  the  junction  of  the  "  State,"  the  branch  of 
the  East  Tennessee,  Virginia  and  Georgia,  and  the  Selma,  Rome  and  Dalton 
railroads,  is  a  flourishing  grain  depot  for  Atlanta ;  here  and  there  on  the  adjacent 
mountains  may  be  seen  fast-crumbling  remnants  of  Johnston's  fortifications, 
erected  a  decade  ago.  At  Cartersville,  fifty  miles  from  Atlanta,  fine  crops  of 
wheat  and  cotton  are  raised ;  large  quarries  of  slate  and  marble  have  been  opened 
arid  worked  successfully ;  and  in  the  vicinity  manganese  has  been  found. 


An  Up-Country  Cotton-Press. 


XXXVIII. 

SAVANNAH,     THE     FOREST     CITY — THE     RAILWAY      SYSTEM     OF 
GEORGIA  —  MATERIAL     PROGRESS     OF     THE     STATE. 


THE  transition  from  the  brisk  air  and  reddish  uplands  of  Northern  Georgia 
to  the  sluggish  atmosphere  and  sombre  voluptuousness  of  the  lowlands  of 
the  coast,  is  startling.  One  seems  to  have  come  upon  another  country,  to  have 
passed  beyond  seas,  so  great  is  the  difference.  The  Savannah  river,  up  which 
you  sail,  returning  from  Florida  some  radiant  morning,  seems  to  you  to  have  no 
affinity  with  the  Savannah  which,  far  among  the  Northern  mountains,  you  saw 
born  of  the  frolicsome  or  riotous  streamlets  forever  leaping  and  roaring  in  the 
passes  or  over  mighty  falls.  Here  it  is  broad,  and  deep,  and  strong,  and,  near 
the  bluff  on  which  the  city  stands,  it  is  freighted  with  ships  from  European  ports 


View  on  the  Savannah  River  near  Savannah,  Georgia. 

and  from  the  Northern  cities  of  our  own  coast.  The  moss-hung  oaks,  the  mag- 
nolias, the  orange-trees,  the  bays,  the  palmettoes,  the  olives,  the  stately  shrubs 
of  arbor  vitae,  the  Cape  myrtles,  the  oleanders,  the  pomegranates,  the  lovely 
japonicas,  astonish  the  eyes  which  have  learned  to  consider  a  more  Northern 
foliage  as   Georgian.     Very  grand  in  their  way  were   the  forests  of  pine,   with 


THE      FOUNDING      OF      SAVANNAH. 


359 


their  sombre  aisles,  and  the  mournful  whispers  of  the  breeze  stealing  through 
them ;  but  here  is  the  charm  of  the  odorous  tropical  South,  which  no  one  can 
explain.  Yet  it  is  not  here  that  one  must  look  for  the  greatest  wealth  of  the 
State ;  for  Middle  Georgia  is,  perhaps, 


the  richest  agricultural  region  in  the 
commonwealth,  and  the  hundreds  of 
farms  along  the  western  boundary  are 
notable  instances  of  thorough  and 
profitable  culture. 

But  here  at  Savannah  began  the 
existence  of  Georgia;  here  it  was  that 
Oglethorpe  planted  his  tiny  colony 
hardly  a  century  and  a-half  ago  ;  here, 
on  the  pine- crowned  bluff,  where  an 
Indian  tribe  dwelt  in  .a  village  called 
Yamacraw,  he  disembarked  the  adven- 
turers who  had  come  with  him  from 
England,  under  the  sanction  of  the 
charter  accorded  by  George  the  Sec- 
ond, and  in  due  time  established  a 
group  of  tents  defended  by  a  battery 

Of   Cannon.        From  this  humble  begin-    .  General  Oglethorpe,  the  Founder  of  Savannah. 

ning  Savannah  soon  grew  to  the  proportions  of  a  town,  and  was  laid  out 
into  squares.  As  the  colonists  had  first  landed  on  the  shore  of  South  Carolina, 
and  been  very  kindly  received  by  the  Carolinians,  they  named  the  streets  of  the 
new  settlement  after  their  benefactors, — Bull,  Drayton,  Whitaker,  St.  Julian  and 
Bryan, — and  some  of  them  still  bear  those  names.  Savannah,  in  1734,  was  a  little 
assemblage  of  squares  in  a  clearing  in  the  pine  forest.  The  inhabitants  locked 
themselves  into  their  cabins  at  night,  because  the  alligators  strolled  through  the 
town,  seeking  whom  they  might  devour ;  and  the  Indians,  who  now  and  then 
threatened  to  "dig  up  the  hatchet"  when  the  colonists  encroached,  kept  all  in 
constant  alarm.  Two  years  later,  the  distinguished  founder  of  Methodism,  John 
Wesley,  preached  his  first  sermon  in  America  in  Savannah. 

An  English  gentleman  who  visited  the  colony  in  this  same  year  tells  us  that 
""the  houses  are  built  at  a  pretty  large  distance  from  one  another,  for  fear  of  fire; 
the  streets  are  very  wide,  and  there  are  great  squares  left  at  proper  spaces  for 
markets  and  other  conveniences."  To  this  fortunate  early  arrangement  the  town 
owes  its  beauty  to-day.  No  other  American  city  has  such  wealth  of  foliage, 
such  charming  seclusion,  such  sylvan  perfection,  so  united  with  all  the  conveni- 
ence and  compactness  of  a  large  commercial  centre.  The  trustees  of  the  colony, 
appointed  under  the  royal  charter,  made  a  strict  agrarian  law,  which  divided  the 
original  town  into  two  hundred  and  forty  "freeholds;  "  the  town  land  covered 
twenty-four  square  miles,  every  forty  houses  (each  house  being  located  on  tracts 
of  land  of  exactly  the  same  size)  making  a  ward;  each  ward  had  a  constable,  and 
under  him  were  four  tithing-men.     Every  ten  houses  made  a  tithing;  and  to  each 


36o 


GEORGIA      OF     THE      PAST. 


tithing  there  was  a  mile  square,  "divided  into  twelve  lots,  besides  roads."  Every 
freeholder  of  the  tithing  had  a  lot  or  farm  of  forty-five  acres  there,  and  two  lots 
were  reserved  by  the  trustees.  Great  efforts  were  used  to  make  Georgia,  as  the 
new  colony  was  called,  after  the  English  king  who  had  granted  the  charter,  "  a 
silk  and  wine-growing  country ;  "  but  after  protracted  trials  the  colonists  gave  up 
their  dreams  of  speedily  realizing  immense  fortune,  and  set  to  work  at  more 
practical  schemes. 

Savannah,  escaping,  as  by  miracle',  from  Indian  malice  and  the  tyranny  of  the 
"trustees,"  who  were  of  small  benefit  to  the  rest  of  the  settlers,  grew  and  flour- 
ished until  John  Reynolds  cam#  out  from  England  as  Governor  in  1754,  the 
trustees  having  resigned.  The  colonists  welcomed  him  joyously  at  first,  but 
afterward  regretted  it,  for  he  was  not  specially  interested  in  them.  He  allowed 
the  town  to  fall  into  decay,  and,  notwithstanding  the  fact  that  the  General 
Assembly  of  Georgia  had  met  at  Savannah  in  1750,  even  considered  the  ques- 
tion of  the  removal  of  the  capital.  This  was  not  effected ;  a  new  Governor  was 
sent  over,  but  the  people  were  rapidly  becoming  independent,  and  the  "  Stamp 
Act"  put  the  same  fever  into  their  blood  that  stirred  the  pulses  of  their  cousins 
in  Massachusetts.  It  is  curious  to  note,  in  view  of  later  events,  that  Savannah 
sent  to  the  Old  Bay  State  much  of  the  powder  used  in  the  defense  of 
Bunker    Hill. 

Among  the  early  excitements  of  Savannah  was  the  trouble  with  the  Span- 
iards in  Florida,  which  finally  culminated  in  open  war.  Spain,  with  her  wonted 
arrogance,  had  firmly  bidden  the  Georgians  quit  their  newly  established  homes ; 
but  Spanish  bravado  did  not  frighten  them.  Anglo- Georgian  and  Hispano- 
Floridian  fortified  one  against  the  other ;  the  same  Spanish  intrigue,  which  was 

at  work  among  the  thousands  of 
negroes  in  South  Carolina,  was  active 
among  the  Indians  in  Georgia.  When 
at  last  England  and  Spain  went  to 
war,  Oglethorpe  and  his  colonists 
played  an  important  part  in  1740, 
and  penetrated  to  the  very  walls  of  St. 
Augustine  in  Florida,  though  they  did 
not  succeed  in  taking  it. 

Although  last  settled  of  the  old 
thirteen  States  of  the  Union,  neither 
Georgia  nor  her  chief  city  was  back- 
ward in  accepting  the  issues  of  the 
revolution.  A  Georgia  schooner  was. 
the  first  commissioned  American  ves- 
sel, and  made  the  first  capture  of  the 
war — sixteen  thousand  pounds  of 
powder.  Savannah  revolted  against 
its  royal  Governor  early  in  1776,  and 
The  Pulaski  Monument  in  savannah,  Georgia.    [Page  36i.]      imprisoned  him;    and   the    next  year 


A      HISTORY-PICTURE SAVANNAH      IN     THE      REVOLUTION. 


36l 


the  convention,  which  formed  the  State  constitution,  met  in  the  city.  Toward 
the  close  of  1778,  the  British,  after  a  savagely  disputed  battle,  captured  the 
city;  a  brutal  soldiery  shot  and  bayoneted  many  citizens  in  the  streets,  and 
imprisoned  others  on  board  the  English  ships.  British  rule,  with  all  the  rigor  of 
military  law, was  enforced  until  an  evac- 
uation was  rendered  expedient  by  the 
success  of  American  arms  elsewhere. 
There  is  one  history-picture  which 
the  memory  of  Savannah's  trials  during 
the  revolution  should  ever  bring  to 
mind,  a  picture  which  has  in  it  the 
sparkle  of  French  color,  and  which 
may  serve  as  a  noble  remembrancer 
of  French  gallantry  and  generosity. 
In  the  dull  and  dreadful  days  of  1779, 
when  English  rule  had  become  all  but 
intolerable,  a  superb  fleet  anchored  off 
Tybee  one  day  in  September,  and  the 
amazed  English  saw  the  French  colors 
displayed  above  twenty  ships  of  the 
line  and  eleven  frigates,  commanded 
by  Count  D'Estaing,  sent  by  the  King 
of  France  to  aid  the  struggling  Ameri- 
cans. Five      thousand      Of      the      best  A  Spanish  Dagger -Tree— Savannah. 

soldiers  of  the  'French  army,  united  with  such  as  the  American  Government  could 
muster,  laid  vigorous  siege  to  the  town ;  troops  were  landed,  and  lively  attacks 
were  made  upon  the  British  positions  by  the  combined  forces  ;  a  strong  bombard- 
ment was  kept  up  for  some  time;  but  the  besiegers  were  finally  compelled  to 
withdraw,  leaving  the  unfortunate  town  to  the  mercies  of  the  enraged  English. 

In  this  long  and  brave  assault,  which  lasted  nearly  two  months,  the  chival- 
rous Pulaski,  who  had  devoted  himself  to  the  cause  of  American  liberty,  lost 
his  life ;  and  there,  fighting  to  save  the  beloved  flag  which  he  had  grown  to 
cherish  more  than  life,  perished  Sergeant  Jasper,  who  had  already  immortalized 
himself  by  keeping  the  American  colors,  at  imminent  risk  of  death,  still  waving 
over  the  battlements  of  Fort  Moultrie  in  Charleston  harbor,  in  the  thick  of  a 
terrific  bombardment. 

Savannah  was,  in  her  early  history,  one  of  the  most  patriotic  of  American 
towns.  She  not  only  produced  men  renowned  for  bravery  and  true  chivalric 
qualities,  but  she  took  every  occasion  to  demonstrate  her  faith  in  the  Union. 
She  received  the  new  President,  Washington,  with  joyous  enthusiasm,  gave 
Lafayette  an  overwhelming  welcome,  and  during  his  visit  laid  the  corner-stones 
of  two  handsome  monuments,  which  are  to-day  counted  among  the  city's  treas- 
ures— those  to  Pulaski  and  General  Greene. 

"The  Forest  City,"  as  the  Georgians  affectionately  call  it,  is  situated  on  a 
sandy  plain,  only  fifty  feet  above  sea-level,  and  eighteen  miles  from  the  mouth 


362 


THE      "FOREST      CITY 


ITS      CLIMATE THE      LEVEE. 


of  the  Savannah  river.  From  the  northern  bank  stretch  away  the  vast  lowland 
rice-fields  of  South  Carolina,  once  under  perfect  cultivation,  but  now  only  here 
and  there  cultured,  and  serving  mainly  as  the  homes  of  a  mass  of  ignorant  and 
dissolute  negroes.  The  city  to-day  is  simply  the  amplification  of  the  old  plan 
of  Oglethorpe  and  the  trustees.  It  is  divided  by  many  wide  streets  and  lanes 
which  intersect  at  right  angles,  and  there  are  many  large  squares  at  regular 
distances.  There  is  little  noise  of  wheels  or  clatter  of  hoofs  in  the  upper  town ; 
the  streets  are  filled  with  a  heavy  black  sand  over  which  dray  and  carriage  alike 
go  noiselessly  ;  one  wanders  in  a  kind  of  a  dream  through  the  pretty  squares,  so 
gay  in  their  dress  of  flowering  shrubs  and  tall  and  graceful  trees ;  it  is  a  city 
through  which  he  moves,  yet  as  tranquil  and  beautiful  as  a  village.  The  winter 
climate  is  delicious ;  the  cold  weather  lasts  hardly  six  weeks ;  many  flowers 
bloom  in  the  open  air  from  November  to  April ;  in  February  the  jessamine  and 
the  peach-tree  are  radiant  with  blossoms ;  and  a  wholesome  sea-breeze  continu- 
ally sweeps  inland.  In  summer,  that  is,  from  April  to  November,  there  is  a  mild 
malaria  in  the  atmosphere,  but  it  has  been  much  reduced  during  the  last  quarter 
century,  and  the  visitations  of  yellow  fever  have  been  rare.  Savannah  certainly 
possesses  the  advantage  of  an  equable  temperature,  for  during  ten  months  of 

the  year,  the  range  is  from  70  to  92 
degrees.  The  mean  temperature  is  the 
same  as  that  of  Gibraltar,  Bermuda, 
Palermo,  Shanghai,  or  Sydney.  The 
Northern  invalids  who  have  been 
helped  by  a  winter  or  two  in  Savannah 
number  hundreds;  and  many  persons 
traveling  to  Florida  in  search  of  re- 
stored health,  have  become  so  fascin- 
ated with  the  Forest  City  as  to  prefer 
stopping  there. 

The  levee  of  Savannah  is  as  pictur- 
esque, though  not  as  extensive,  as 
that  of  New  Orleans.  Looking  down 
from  the  bluff,  along  whose  summit 
"  the  Bay,"  the  principal  commercial 
avenue,  runs,  one  sees  a  forest  of 
masts ;  a  mass  of  warehouses,  not 
unhandsomely  grouped ;  cotton-presses, 
surrounded  by  active,  chattering  toil- 
ers ;  long  processions  of  mule-teams, 
crowds  of  sailors  talking  in  every 
known  language,  rice-mills,  high  mys- 
terious stairways,  with  wondrous  effects 
of  light  and  shade  on  their  broad  steps, 
winding  walls,  and    railroad  wharves. 

"Looking  down  from  the  bluff"— Savannah.  Along     the     Water-front      the      business 


ALONG    THE     LEVEES TRIBUTARY     RAILWAYS. 


363 


blocks  are  so  constructed  that  they  rise  above  the  bluff,  and  are  connected  with 
Bay  street  by  means  of  platforms  and  balconies  from  which  one  can  look  down, 
as  from  house-tops,  on  the  busy  life  of  the  port.  The  few  buildings  which  the 
great  fire  of  1820  spared  give  an  air  of  quaintness  and  age  to  the  whole. 

As  we  walked,  day  by  day,  through  the  Savannah  streets,  late  in  autumn, 
we  were  amazed  at  the  masses  of  cotton  bales  piled  everywhere.  They  lined 
the  commercial  avenues  for  hundreds  and  hundreds  of  rods;  down  by  the  water- 
side they  were  heaped  in  mammoth  piles,  and  the  processions  of  drays  seemed 
endless.  The  huge  black  ships  swallowed  bale  after  bale ;  the  clank  of  the 
hoisting-crane  was  heard  from  morning  till  night.  At  the  great  stone  Custom- 
House  the  talk  was  of  cotton;  at  the  quaint  old  "Exchange,"  in  front  of  which 
Sherman  reviewed  his  army  in  1865,  cotton  was  the  theme;  and  in  all  the  offices 
from  end  to  end  of  long  and  level  Bay  street,  we  encountered  none  save  busy 
buyers  and  factors,  worshiping  the  creamy  staple,  and  gossiping  rapturously  of 
"  middlings  "  low,  and  profits  possible. 


"The  huge  black  ships  swallowed  bale  after  bale." 

Savannah's  progress  since  the  war  has  not  been  less  remarkable  than  that  of 
the  whole  State.  The  recuperation  of  its  railroad  system  has  been  astonishing. 
Sherman's  army,  in  its  march  to  the  sea,  destroyed  one  hundred  and  ten  miles  of 
the  Georgia  Central  railroad  track  between  Savannah  and  Macon,  and  thirty-nine 
miles  between  Savannah  and  Augusta.  The  military  authorities  returned  the 
road  to  the  control  of  its  directors,  June  22,  1865,  and  early  in  1866  it  was 
reconstructed  so  as  to  answer  the  public  demand.  This  immense  corporation  at 
present  operates  in  its  interest,  with  its  tributaries,  1,545  miles  of  railway.  It 
extends  from  Savannah  to  Macon,  thence  by  the  South-western  and  Muscogee 
road  to  the  thriving  cotton-spinning  town  of  Columbus,  thence  by  the  Columbus 
and  Opelika  route  to  Opelika,  a  brisk  manufacturing  town  in  Alabama,  thence  to 
Montgomery,  and  through  Selma  gets  an  unbroken  rail  communication  with  the 
Mississippi  river  at  Vicksburg.      This,  it  is  expected,  will  be  the  connecting  point 


364 


THE  GEORGIA  CENTRAL THE  ATLANTIC  AND  GULF  ROAD. 


of  the  Southern  Pacific  route  with  the  roads  leading  to  the  Atlantic  coast.  The 
Central's  connections  also  give  Savannah  direct  communication  with  New  York 
and  Memphis  via  the  Atlanta  and  Chattanooga  route,  and  connection  at  Augusta 
with  the  South  Carolina  road.  From  Macon  it  sends  out  another  arm  to 
grasp    Atlanta,  —  the    Macon    and    Western    road, — and    there,    also,    connects 

with  the  Georgia  railroad  to  Eufaula, 
Alabama,  whence,  by  steamers  on  the 
Chattahoochee  river,  it  secures  an 
outlet  to  the  Gulf  of  Mexico.  It  is 
interested  in  a  host  of  small  local 
lines,  and  has,  indeed,  spread  an  al- 
most perfect  network  over  the  State, 
contributing  in  the  highest  degree  to 
the  prosperity  of  Georgia,  by  the 
superb  facilities  which  it  has  afforded 
for  transportation  of  products.  On 
its  trunk  lines,  during  harvest,  immense 
cotton-trains  run  night  and  day,  bring- 
ing to  Savannah  the  fleeces  plucked 
from  the  fields  of  Georgia,  Alabama, 
and  Tennessee.  The  Central  has  long 
been  a  banking  as  well  as  a  railroad 
company,  and  has  always  paid  large 
dividends.  The  railroad  interest  in 
Georgia  is  secondary  to  none  other 
but  agriculture.  The  various  compa- 
nies, great  and  small,  are  managed 
with  much  ability,  and  new  projects 
for  local  and  through  routes  are  rarely 
received  with  disfavor.  Savannah  is  somewhat  excited  over  the  possibilities  of 
the  completion  of  the  Southern  Pacific  route  to  San  Diego,  in  California,  as  the 
surveys  have  shown  her  to  be  the  nearest  Eastern  port  on  an  air  line  from  the 
Pacific  terminus.* 

The  Atlantic  and  Gulf  railroad  is  another  important  feeder  to  Savannah.  It  is 
the  main  thoroughfare  connecting  Savannah  with  Florida,  Southern  and  South- 
western Georgia,  and  Eastern  Alabama,  and  extends  to  Bainbridge  on  Flint  river, 
237  miles  from  Savannah.  From  Lawton  to  Live  Oak  runs  a  branch  road  con- 
necting the  Florida  system  with  that  of  Georgia — at  present  the  only  Northern 
outlet  for  the  dwellers  in  the  flowery  peninsula.  A  road  from  Macon  crosses  the 
Atlantic  and  Gulf  route  fifty-six  miles  from  Savannah,  and  gives  Brunswick, 
which  was  at  one  time  expected  to  be  a  great  city,  an  important  outlet  by  land. 
The  Savannah  and  Charleston  railroad,  completely  destroyed  during  the  war,  has 

*  Savannah  would  be,  by  shortest  distance  from  San  Diego,  2,070  miles  ;  Charleston,  2,184; 
Norfolk,  2,331.  The  completion  of  a  Southern  Pacific  railway  will  certainly  add  immensely  to 
the  commercial  importance  of  Savannah. 


An  old  Stairway  on  the  Levee  at  Savannah. 


STEAMSHIP  LINES EXPORTS  OF  UPLAND  COTTON, 


365 


been  rebuilt,  but  is  so  poorly  stocked  that  it  is  a  penance  to  ride  over  it,  although 
the  lowland  scenery  through  which  it  runs  is  among  the  most  exquisite  in  the 
Atlantic  States.  The  grand  canebrakes,  unsubdued  and  seemingly  impene- 
trable, extending  on  either  side  the  track  for  miles ;  the  stretch  of  lovely  field, 
with  the  fawn  and  rabbit  bounding 
across  it;  the  odorous  forest,  with 
its  stately  avenues  of  pine ;  the  little 
villages  of  the  gatherers  of  naval 
stores;  the  mossy  boughs  and  tangled' 
vines;  the  muddy-colored  rivers,  and 
the  marshes  filled  with  wildest  masses 
of  decaying  vegetation — all  add  to 
the  charm. 

The  numerous  steamship  lines 
from  Savannah  to  Liverpool,  New 
York,  Philadelphia,  and  Boston,  carry 
away  enormous  quantities  of  cotton, 
and  if  the  needed  improvements  at  the 
mouth  of  the  river  were  made,  the 

Commerce    Of   the    port   WOuld    be  Very  The  Custom-House  at  Savannah. 

much    increased.       The    entrance    is    considered    one    of    the    easiest    on    the 
Southern  coast,  the  bar  having  a  depth    of  nineteen    feet  of  water  upon  it  at 

mean  low  tide,  and  a  rise  of 
seven  feet  on  the  flood;  but  it  is 
now  necessary  that  the  obstruc- 
tions placed  in  the  stream  in 
war  time  be  removed,  and  that 
extensive  dredging  be  accom- 
plished. 

The  total  amount  of  upland 
cotton  exported  from  Savannah 
in  American  vessels,  from  July 
1,  1865,  to  June  30,  1872,  was 
7°4>373  bales,  or  323,202,812 
pounds,  valued  at  $59,537,460; 
total  amount  of  sea-island  cot- 
ton exported  in  American  ves- 
sels, 12,437  bales,  valued  at 
$2,062,576.  In  foreign  ves- 
sels during  the  same  period, 
1,292,979  bales  of  upland  cot- 

View  in  Bonaventure  Cemetery— Savannah,     f Page  368.]  ton,     Valued      at      $124,562,590, 

and  21,899  bales  of  sea-island    cotton,   valued    at  $4,057,708,  were   exported. 
The  coastwise  trade  was  also  very  large,  amounting  to  1,539,560  bales  of  upland 
and  40,574  bales  of  sea-island  cotton. 
24 


366 


VALUE     OF    EXPORTS    AND     IMPORTS    SINCE     1866. 


The  value  of  both  exports  and  imports  since  1866  has  been  as  follows  r 


1867 $41,225,488 

1868 -. . .    50,226,209 

1869..  . .  : 49,152,639 


1870 $58,850,198 

1871 64,893,892 

1872 68,100,164 


and  in  1873  they  did  not  fall  short  of  the  amount  in  1872.  Savannah  and 
Charleston  are  rivals  in  the  cotton  trade,  and  the  newspapers  of  the  two  cities 
fight  at  every  opportunity  with  an  eager  fierceness.  Savannah  is  now  receiving 
more  than  700,000  bales  of  cotton  yearly.  .  The  crop  of  Georgia  alone,  I  should 
say,  is  rather  more  than  that  in  successful  years ;  and,  at  the  rate  at  which  the 
production  in  the  regions  tributary  to  the  Forest  City  is  increasing,  she  will 
soon  rank  with  New  Orleans.  There  is  an  enormous  disparity  between  the 
amount  of  exports  and  imports;  most  of  the  vessels  which  enter  the  port  of 

Savannah  are  compelled  to  go  there  in 
ballast.  If  cotton  were  taken  away 
from  the  town,  there  would  be  little 
vivacity  left.  The  aim  of  the  port  is 
to  control  the  cotton  of  South  Caro- 
lina, Georgia,  Alabama  and  Florida, 
and  it  is  entered  in  the  lists  as  a  for- 
midable competitor  with  Charleston  for 
supremacy.  A  flourishing  cotton  ex- 
change, earnest  merchants  and  manu- 
facturers, and  certain  advantages  of 
location,  are  doing  much  to  place  Sa- 
vannah first  among  the  Southern  At- 
lantic cities. 

There  is  a  constant  drain  of  emi- 
gration from  the  poorer  districts  of 
Georgia,  as  from  Alabama,  and,  indeed, 
from  most  of  the  cotton  States.  Hun- 
dreds of  poor  Georgians,  unable  to 
make  a  living  from  the  worn-out  soil, 
under  the  new  order  of  things,  fly  to 
Texas.  Yet  Georgia  certainly  does  not 
grow  weaker.  Her  material  progress 
is  in  the  highest  degree  encouraging. 


The  Independent  Presbyterian  Church  —  Savannah. 
[Page  369.] 


Her  valuation,  in  1858,  counting  the  slaves  as  capital,  v/as  over  $600,000,000; 
the  revolution  decreased  it  to  $148,122,525,  on  a  gold  basis,  in  1866.  The 
commonwealth  had  been  racked  literally  to  pieces  by  the  invasion  and  support 
of  a  merciless  army.  She  was  weighted  down  so  heavily  that  recovery  seemed 
impossible.  Yet  she  grew  in  strength  and  prosperity  year  by  year  thenceforward. 
In  1872  she  returned  a  valuation  in  gold  of  $213,160,808,  a  substantial  increase 
in  six  years  of  nearly  $75,000,000  in  currency.  In  other  words  she  increased 
her  wealth  by  about  the  total  gold  value  of  all  her  lands — some  30,000,000  acres. 


Georgia's    material    progress  —  the    railway    mania. 


367 


This  liberal  increase  was  accomplished  despite  a  decrease  in  the  number  of 
laborers,  for  although  the  aggregate  population  had  increased  since  the  war, 
there  were  only  114,999  laborers  reported  in  1871,  while  in  1866  there  were 
139,988.  In  1872  the  number  had  still  further  decreased,  and  it  is  estimated 
that  in  six  years  near- 
ly 30,000  labore  rs 
have  been  lost  to  the 
State.*  But  the  im- 
proved methods  of 
culture,  and  the  use 
of  powerful  fertilizers, 
as  well  as  the  influence 
of  an  energetic  spirit 
which  perhaps  distin- 
guishes the  Georgian 
above  his  neighbors  of 
the  other  States,  have 
enabled  the  lessened 
number  of  workers  to 
do  what  few  dared  to 
predict  as  possible.  It 
is  estimated  that  in  six 
years    and  a-half  the 

increase      in     the     total  View  m  Forsyth  Park  — Savannah.     I  Page  369.] 

value  of  the  property  of  the  State  has  been  forty-four  per  cent.  It  is  to  be 
regretted  that  the  legislators  of  a  commonwealth  which  has  shown  itself  capable 
of  such  an  elastic  rebound  from  ruin  and  misfortune  should  embarrass  their 
future  prospects  by  ominously  talking  of  repudiation.  Now  that  the  majority 
of  the  plantations  are  in  good  condition ;  now  that  the  farming  implements 
destroyed  in  the  war  have  been  replaced ;  now  that  the  quantity  of  live  stock 
in  all  sections  has  been  nearly  doubled  since  1 867 ;  and  that  the  planters  look 
confidently  forward  to  the  time  when  Georgia  shall  produce  a  million  bales 
yearly, — in  spite  of  all  the  drawbacks  and  failures  of  an  imperfect  and  vexa- 
tious labor  system, —  it  is  hardly  wise  to  threaten  the  State's  credit  with 
destruction,  because  of  the  irregularities  which  the  government  inaugurated 
by  reconstruction  brought  into  existence.  With  caution  in  future,  and  with 
some  check  upon  the  multitude  of  railway  schemes  constantly  proposed,  Georgia 
can  easily  carry  all  the  debt  she  has  contracted,  until  she  finds  herself  able 
to  discharge  it  honorably.  Railroad  building  and  speculation  have  always 
been  passions  dear  to  the  Georgian  heart ;  and,  within  thirty  years,  more  than 
$40,000,000  were  invested  in  lines  built  in  the  State. 

So  feverish  has  become  the  railroad  mania  that  there  is  a  class  who  are  in 
favor  of  an  inhibition  of  State  aid  to  works  of  internal  improvement,  and  who 

*  The  population  of  Georgia,  in  i860,  was  1,057,286,  divided  into  591,550  whites,  2500  free 
and  462,198  slave  blacks.     In  1870,  the  population  was  1,200,609;  number  of  blacks,  545,132. 


> 


?68 


AUTUMN-TIME     IN     SAVANNAH BONAVENTURE. 


would  be  glad  to  see  a  clause  to  that  effect  inserted  in  the  Constitution.  It  is 
expected  that  in  due  time  a  convention  will  be  called  for  the  purpose  of  altering 
the  Constitution  in  many  ways,  as  the  Georgia  Conservative  press  and  politicians 
are  clamorous  for  one  to  take  the  place  of  "  the  instrument  dignified  with  that 
name  and  forced  upon  the  people  by  Federal  intervention." 

Autumn-time  in  Georgia,  when  harvest  is  nearly  over,  is  brisk  and  redolent 
of  inspiring  gayety.  In  the  last  days  of  November  the  towns  and  cities  are  filled 
with  the  planters  from  hundreds  of  miles  round  about ;  money  flows  plentifully ; 
at  Savannah  there  are  agricultural  fairs,  races,  reviews  of  the  fine  military  organ- 
izations which  the  city  boasts,  balls,  and  wassail.  The  halls  of  the  Screven  and 
the  Pulaski,  Savannah's  two  prime  hotels,  echo  to  the  cheery  laugh  of  the  tall 
and  handsome  planter,  as  w.ell  as  to  the  cough  of  the  Northern  invalid.  On  a 
bright  day  in  December,  when  a  stiff  breeze  is  blowing  through  the  odorous 
foliage,  Savannah  presents  an  aspect  of  gayety  and  vivacity  hardly  Southern 
in  character.  Elegant  equipages  dash  along  the  hard  white  roads  leading  to  the 
pretty  river-side  resort  known  as  "  Thunderbolt,"  or  the  sombre,  mystical  aisles 
of  the  "Bonaventure"  cemetery.  Where  the  Tatnall  family  once  lived  in  regal 
splendor,  Savannah  now  buries  its  dead.     There  are  many  fine  monuments  in 

the    Forest    Cemetery,   but 


no  marble  can  vie  in  beauty 
and  grandeur  with  the 
mighty  yet  graceful  live 
oaks  which  spread  their 
arched  boughs  and  superb 
foliage. 

From  Bonaventure  one 
may  look  out  across  the 
lowlands  traversed  by  estu- 
aries, along  which  steamers 
crawl  on  the  inland  route 
to  Florida;  or  may  stray 
into  cool  pineries;  and,  re- 
turning, find  himself  beneath 
such  lofty  domes,  or  such 
broad  and  majestic  aisles, 
with  pavements  of  tesselated 
sun  and  shade,  that  he  will 
start  with  surprise  to  dis- 
cover, upon  awaking  from 
his  day-dream,  that  he  is 
not  wandering  in  some  giant 

''Forsyth  park  contains  a  massive  fountain."     [Page  369.]  Cathedral.        The    inhabitants 

of  Savannah  have  the  delights  of  sea-bathing  and  sea  air  within  a  few  miles  of 
town  at  such  pretty  resorts  as  the  "Thunderbolt,"  the  Isle  of  Hope,  Beaulieu, 
Montgomery,  and  White  Bluff. 


FORSYTH     PARK THE     SAVANNAH     POLICE. 


369 


From  the  steeple  of  the  venerable  Exchange  one  can  get,  here  and  there, 
glimpses  of  Savannah's  especial  curiosities.  On  Bull  street  he  can  see  the 
Masonic  Hall,  where  the  ordinance  of  secession  was  passed  in  1861  ;  and,  pierc- 
ing the  foliage,  the  tall  spire  of  the  Independent  Presbyterian  Church,  or  St. 
John's,  or  the  Ionic  proportions  of  Christ  Church,  in  the  parish  over  which  John 
Wesley  was  once  rector ;  and  may  look  down  into  parks  where  flashing  fountains 
scatter  their  spray-jets  upon  lovely  beds  of  flowers.  Forsyth  park  contains  a 
massive  fountain,  around  which,  as  in  continental  cities,  troops  of  children  and 
their  nurses  are  always  straying.  In  Monument  square  rises  a  handsome  shaft 
to  the  memory  of  Greene  and  Pulaski.  Monument  square  is  one  of  the  principal 
centres  in  Savannah,  and  around  it  are  grouped  the  hotels  and  the  State  Bank 
edifice;  the  Bank  itself  exists  no  longer.  The  Pulaski  monument,  a  beautiful 
marble  shaft,  surrounded  by  a  figure  of  the  Goddess  of  Liberty,  ornaments  still 


another  square.  Wandering 
up  Bull,  or  Drayton,  or  along 
Broad  streets,  one  sees  shop, 
theatre,  public  hall,  market, 
luxurious  private  dwellings, 
many-balconied  and  cool,  and 
fountain  and  monument;  yet 
feels  around  him  the  tranquillity 
and  beauty  of  the  Southern 
forest.  Each  one  of  the  30,000 
inhabitants  of  Savannah  should 
carry  a  benediction  in  his  heart 
for  the  founders  of  the  colony, 
who  gave  Savannah  such  scope 
for  gardens  and  parks,  for  fount- 
ains and  shaded  avenues. 


A  Savannah  Sergeant 
of  Police. 


The  municipal  control  of  the 
town  thus  pleasantly  situated 
is  very  nearly  perfect.  The 
police  corps  is  a  military  or- 
ganization, clothed  in  Confed- 
erate gray,  subject  to  strict 
discipline,  armed  with  rifles, 
revolvers  and  sabres,  and  occu- 
pying a  handsome  garrison 
barracks  in  a  central  location. 
It  is  one  of  the  prides  of  the 
city,  and  General  Anderson, 
an  ex- United  States  and  Con- 
federate officer,  keeps  it  in 
perfect  discipline.  Only  now 
and    then,  in  the    troublesome 


days  of  reconstruction,  did  it  come  into  collision  with  the  factions  at  election  time. 
One  policeman  wanders  over  each  ward  every  night.  There  is  but  little  violation 
of  law,  save  in  the  brawls  incidental  to  a  seaport,  and  the  larcenies  arising  from 
the  undeveloped  moral  consciousness  of  the  freedman.  The  negroes  no  longer 
have  any  voice  whatever  in  political  matters,  and  are  not  represented  in  the  City 
Government.  The  registration  law  in  the  city,  which  was  in  force  at  the  outset  of 
reconstruction,  has  been  abolished.  There  are  only  400  negro  voters  registered 
in  the  city.  The  banking  capital  of 'Savannah  was  decreased  from  $12,000,000 
to  $3,000,000  by  the  war,  but  the  city  owes  comparatively  little  money,  has  a 
valuation  of  $16,000,000,  and  manages  to  do  much  business  on  small  capital. 

Education  in  the  city,  and  in  the  thickly  settled  county  of  Chatham  surround- 
ing it,  is  making  far  better  progress  than  in  the  back-country.  In  1866  the  Board 
of  Education  in  Savannah  was  made  a  corporate  body,  and  a  most  excellent 
system  of  schools  for  white  children  was  inaugurated,  to  which  have  now  been 
added  several  schools  for  the  colored  children.  The  Peabody  Fund  does  its  good 
work  there,  as  elsewhere.     Twenty-five  hundred  white  children  attend  the  ses- 


37o 


EDUCATION     IN     SAVANNAH. 


sions,  but  only  400  or  500  out  of  the  3,000  negro  children  in  Savannah  have  been 
accorded  facilities.  There  is  a  good  deal  of  absurd  prejudice  in  Savannah  against 
the  colored  man  yet,  and,  although  the  Board  seems  inclined  to  do  its  duty,  the 
citizens  do  not  urge  any  effective  effort  to  raise  Sambo  out  of  his  ignorance. 
Savannah  is  quite  rich  in  private,  educational,  charitable  and  literary  institutions, 


General  Sherman's  Head -quarters  —  Savannah. 

prominent  among  which  are  the  Union  Society  and  the  Female  Asylum  for 
Orphans,  the  former  on  the  site  of  the  Orphan  House  which  Whitfield  established 
in  1740.  The  Georgia  Historical  and  Medical  Societies  are.  flourishing,  and  of 
excellent  reputation.  The  house  occupied  by  General  Sherman  as  his  head- 
quarters, after  the  capture  of  Savannah  during  the  late  war,  is  still  pointed  out 
to  visitors. 


XXXIX. 

GEORGIAN     AGRICULTURE "CRACKERS" — COLUMBUS — MACON. 

SOCIETY ATHENS THE     COAST. 

IT  is  not  without  some  little  bitterness  that  a  Georgia  journalist  recently 
wrote :  "  A  Georgia  farmer  uses  a  Northern  axe-helve  and  axe  to  cut 
tip  the  hickory  growing  within  sight  of  his  door;  ploughs  his  fields  with  a 
Northern  plough  ;  chops  out  his  cotton  with  a  New  England  hoe  ;  gins  his 
cotton  upon  a  Boston  gin;  hoops  it  with  Pennsylvania  iron;  hauls  it  to  mar- 
ket in  a  Concord  wagon,  while  the  little  grain  that  he  raises  is  cut  and  prepared 
for  sale  with  Yankee  implements.  We  find  the  Georgia  housewife  cooking 
with  an  Albany  stove ;  and  even  the  food,  especially  the  luxuries,  are  imported 
from  the  North.  Georgia's  fair  daughters  are  clothed  in  Yankee  muslins  and 
decked  in  Massachusetts  ribbons  and  Rhode  Island  jewelry." 

Yea,  verily !  Throughout  the  cotton  States  this  statement  holds  true. 
In  the  interior  cotton  districts  of  Georgia  there  is  often  a  great  deal  of 
pecuniary  distress,  because  the  condition  of  the  market  or  the  failure  of  the 
crop  presses  sorely  on  those  who  have  given  no  care  to  raise  anything  for 
self-support,  and  who  have  staked  their  all  on  cotton.  Diversified  industry 
would  make  of  Georgia,  in  twenty  years,  a  second  New  York ;  for  even  in 
her  present  ill-organized  condition  she  actually  makes  great  progress.  The 
creation  of  manufacturing  centres  like  Columbus,  Macon,  Albany,  Thomaston, 
Augusta,  Atlanta,  Marietta,  Athens,  and  Dalton  is  encouraging,  but  much 
remains  to  be  done.  Only  about  five  millions  of  dollars  are  invested  in  the 
manufacture  of  cotton  and  woolen  goods  in  the  State  as  yet,  and  the  grand 
water  power  of  the  Chattahoochee  still  remains  but  little  employed.  Agricul- 
ture must,  therefore,  be  the  main  stay  of  the  commonwealth,  and  the  pros- 
pect is,  on  the  whole,   encouraging. 

The  present  cash  value  of  the  farms  in  Georgia  is  considerably  more  than 
one  hundred  million  dollars,  and  might  be  doubled  by  something  like  syste- 
matic and  thorough  cultivation.  The  number  of  small  farms  is  steadily  increasing, 
and  the  negroes  have  acquired  a  good  deal-  of  land  which,  in  the  cotton  sec- 
tions, they  recklessly  devote  entirely  to  the  staple,  with  an  improvidence  and 
carelessness  of  the  future  which  is  bewildering  to  the  foresighted  observer. 
They  are  fond  of  the  same  pleasures  which  their  late  masters  give  themselves 
so  freely — hunting,  fishing,  and  lounging;  pastimes  which  the  superb  forests, 
the  noble  streams,  the  charming  climate  minister  to  very  strongly.  In  the 
lower  part  of  the  State,  in  the  piney  woods  and  swamps,  the  inhabitants  are 
indolent,  uneducated,  complaining    and    shiftless.       They  are    all  of  the    same 


372 


THE     GEORGIA     "CRACKERS. 


stamp  as  the  old  woman  who  explained  to  a  hungry  and  thirsty  traveler  that 
they  could  n't  give  him  any  milk,  "  because  the  dog  was  dead !  "  Applying 
his  perceptive  powers  to  this  singular  remark,  he  discovered  that  the  defunct 
dog  had  been  wont  to  drive  up  the  cows  to  be  milked  at  eventide,  and  that 

since  his  death  it  had  not 
occurred  to  any  of  the 
family  to  go  themselves 
in  search  of  the  kine. 
People  who  have  plenty 
of  cattle,  and  might  raise 
the  finest  beef  and  mut- 
ton, rarely  see  milk  or 
butter,  and  wear  out  their 
systems  with  indigestible 
pork  and  poor  whiskey. 
Their  indolence,  igno- 
rance, and  remoteness 
from  any  well-ordered 
farming  regions  are  the 
excuses.  These  are  the 
sallow  and  lean  people 
who  always  feel  "  tolla- 
ble," but  who  never  feel 
well ;  a  people  of  dry  fibre 
and  coarse  existence,  yet 
not  devoid  of  wit  and 
good  sense. 

The  Georgia  "cracker"" 
is  eminently  shiftless  ;  he 

A  Pair  of  Georgia  "Crackers."  Seems     to     fancy     that    he 

was  born  with  his  hands  in  his  pockets,  his  back  curved,  and  his  slouch 
hat  crowded  over  his  eyes,  and  does  his  best  to  maintain  this  attitude  forever. 
Quarrels,  as  among  the  lower  classes  generally  throughout  the  South,  grow 
into  feuds,  cherished  for  years,  until  some  day,  at  the  cross-roads,  or  the  country 
tavern,  a  pistol  or  a  knife  puts  a  bloody  and  often  a  fatal  end  to  the  difficulty. 
There  is,  in  all  the  sparsely  settled  agricultural  portion  of  Georgia,  too  much 
popular  vengeance,  too  much  taking  the  law  into  one's  own  hands;  but  there 
is  a  gradual  growth  of  opinion  against  this,  and  even  now  it  is  by  no  means 
so  pronounced  as  in  Kentucky  and  some  other  more  northward  States.      The 

"d n  nigger"  is  usually  careful  to  be  unobtrusive  in  quarrels  with  white 

men,  as  the  rural  Caucasian  has  a  kind  of  subdued  thirst  for  negro  gore,  which, 
when  once  really  awakened,  is  not  readily  appeased.  Yet,  on  the  whole,  consid- 
ering the  character  which  the  revolution  has  assumed  in  Georgia  since  the  fall  of 
the  reconstruction  government  there,  it  is  astonishing  that  the  two  races  get  ort 
so  well  together  as  they  do. 


x^y^- 


COLUMBUS     AND     ITS     MANUFACTURES. 


373 


Columbus,  on  the  border  of  Alabama,  separated  from  that  State  by  the  Chat- 
tahoochee river,  which  gives  it  an  outlet  to  the  Gulf,  through  Florida,  is  a  lively, 
thriving  town,  which  must  one  day  rival  Lowell  or  Manchester,  because  its  water 
power  is  exceptionally  fine.  The  river,  some  distance  above  the  city,  flows 
through  a  rugged  and  beautiful  ravine,  where  the  best  building  stone  is  to 
be  had.  It  is  said  by  competent  authorities  that  along  the  stream,  within  two 
miles  of  the  city,  there  are  sixty  sites,  each  large  enough  for  the  establishment  of 
a  capacious  factory.  Columbus  impressed  me  more  favorably  than  any  other 
manufacturing  town  I  had  seen  in  the  far  South.  It  lies  right  at  the  centre  of  the 
cotton  belt,  is  pierced  by  six  important  railways,  receives  about  1 30,000  cotton 
bales  yearly,  and  in  the  mills  of  the  Columbus  Manufacturing,  and  Eagle  and 
Phcenix  Companies,  employs  hundreds  of  women  and^  children.  The  streets  are 
wide  and  cheery ;  the  shops  and  stores  quite  fine  ;  the  residences  pretty ;  the 
little  town  of  Girard  across  the  river,  built  by  the  mill  proprietors  as  a  home  for 
th*eir  operatives,  is  charming^  there  is  an  aspect  of  life,  and  energy,  and  content 
in  the  place  strongly  contrasted  with  the  dead  and  stagnant  towns,  of  which  I  had 
seen  so  many.  True,  there  were  hosts  of  idle  negroes  roosting  in  shady  places 
about  the  squares,  and  under  the  porticoes,  but  they  are  found  everywhere  in  the 
South.  The  managers  of  the  cotton-mills  will  not  employ  them  in  their  estab- 
lishments. When  I  asked  one  of  the  superintendents  why  not,  he  smiled  quaintly, 
and  said :  "  Put  a  negro  in  one  of  those  rooms  with  a  hundred  looms,  and  the 
noise  would  put  him  to  sleep."  To  which,  never  having  seen  the  "man  and 
brother  "  under  the  specified  circumstances,  I  could,  of  course,  make  no  answer. 

Columbus  has  direct  water  communication  with  Texas,  the  great  wool  market 
of  the  future,  and  could  supply  woolen- mills  very  readily  and  cheaply.  The 
Columbus  manufactur- 
ers claim  that  a  bale 
of  cotton  can  be  man- 
ufactured twenty-two 
dollars  cheaper  there 
than  in  or  near  Boston, 
and  that  their  labor  is 
thirty  per  cent,  cheap- 
er, while  they  are  never 
subject  to  obstructions 
from  ice.*  The  opera- 
tives in  the  mills  were 
evidently  saving  mo- 
ney, and  their  houses 
and  gardens  were 
models  of  neatness  and  The  EagIe  and  Phoenix  Cotton-Mi,ls-Columbus>  Gco^a- 

comfort.     After  riding  all  day  through   regions  where  the  log-cabin  was  oftener 
seen  than  the  frame-house,  and  where  the  forests  still  hold  possession  of  nine- 

*  The  first  cotton  factory  established  at  Macon  has  sometimes  divided  twenty-one  per  cent, 
yearly,  and  is  gradually  accumulating  a  very  large  surplus  fund. 


374  MACON SOCIETY     AND     POLITICS. 

tenths  of  the  land,  it  was  refreshing  to  come  upon  a  town  of  such  energy,  activity 
and  prospects  as  Columbus. 

The  journey  from  Savannah  to  Macon  carries  one  well  out  of  the  lowlands 
into  a  high,  rolling  country,  admirably  suited  to  cotton- raising.  Macon  is  the 
site  of  the  annual  Georgia  fair,  which,  late  in  autumn,  all  the  planters  attend. 
The  smaller  towns  around  about  it  on  the  various  lines  of  rail  are  not  very  prom- 
ising in  appearance.  The  unpainted  houses  seem  deserted  until  one  sees  half- 
a-dozen  negro  children  pop  their  heads  above  the  window-sills,  and  the  "judge," 
and  the  "  colonel,"  and  the  "  doctor  "  come  lazily  to  the  train  to  get  the  mail  and 
the  newspaper.  In  most  of  the  towns  the  train- conductor  is  looked  upon  with 
awe,  and  is  invariably  addressed  as  "captain."  The  railroads  are  well  managed 
in  everything  save  speed,  and  the  natives  traveling  are  always  civil  and  commu- 
nicative. Macon  is  picturesquely  perched  on  a  hill,  around  which  a  densely 
wooded  country  stretches  away  in  all  directions.  The  Ocmulgee  river  winds 
between  broken  and  romantic  banks  not  far  from  the  town  ;  and  near  it  are 
many  Indian  mounds  and  the  site  of  a  venerable  fort,  used  during  the  wars  with 
the  Cherokees.  The  cotton  factories,  large  iron  foundries  and  the  railway  activity 
of  Macon,  give  it  even  a  more  sprightly  appearance  than  Columbus ;  but  the  lat- 
ter has  15,000  population,  while  Macon  has  but  10,000.  The  Wesleyan  Female 
College  and  the  Southern  Botanic- Medical  Institute,  as  well  as  the  State  Academy 
for  the  Blind,  are  located  at  Macon.  From  the  pretty  Rose  Hill  cemetery  the 
outlook  over  the  Ocmulgee  is  very  fine. 

Society  is  good  and  cultured  in  Savannah  and  in  most  of  the  large  towns 
through  the  State.  There  is  still  bitterness  and  ostracism  for  him  who  votes 
the  Republican  ticket,  whether  he  comes  with  the  odor  of  carpet  -  baggery 
about  him  or  not.  Savannah  is  more  courteous  and  liberal  in  her  sentiments 
than  a  few  years  since,  but  keeps  up  a  latent  bitter  feeling,  ready  to  be  flashed 
out  on  good  occasions.  These  remarks  do  not  apply  with  so  much  force  to 
the  gentlemen  as  to  the  ladies,  for  the  average  Southern  man  is  altogether  too 
American  and  too  frank  to  show  resentment  toward  individuals  because  they 
represent  the  best  element  of  a  party  whose  worst  elements  are  obnoxious  to 
him.  There  is  a  tendency  among  large  numbers  of  the  men  to  sink  politics, 
and  to  attend  with  all  their  energies  to  business.  But  all  seem  determined  to 
make  Georgia's  government  one  "for  white  men;"  and  whenever  there  is  any 
need  for  concerted  action,  every  one  is  alert.  Still  it  is  morally  certain  that 
before  a  continued  prosperity  all  political  troubles  will  finally  disappear.  The 
labor  question  is  the  important  one  for  Georgia,  and  all  the  other  cotton  States, 
to  settle.  The  negro,  after  he  discovers  what  he  loses  by  allowing  himself 
to  be  intimidated  or  talked  out  of  his  vote,  will  learn  to  respect  it,  and  use  it 
intelligently.  The  negroes  of  the  State  are  possessed  of  no  small  acuteness 
and  power  of  development,  and,  wherever  there  are  educational  facilities  for  it, 
they  speedily  improve  them.  The  especial  need  of  the  race  is  good  teachers, 
raised  from  its  own  ranks,  and  the  creation  of  the  university  at  Atlanta  for  the 
colored  population  was  one  of  the  most  beneficent  works  of  the  American  Mis- 
sionary Society. 


GEORGIAN      LOWLAND      SCENERY. 


375 


The  Georgia  University  at  Athens,  frequented,  of  course,  exclusively  by 
whites,  is  an  excellent  institution.  It  was  endowed  by  the  Legislature  in  1788, 
but  did  not  begin  its  sessions  until  1801,  since  which  time  it  has  been  noted 
among  Southern  literary  institutions.  Milledgeville,  the  quondam  capital  of 
Georgia,  is  a  quaint  and  pretty  little  town  on  the  Oconee  river,  not  far  from 
Macon.  The  State  asylum  for  the  insane  is  located  there,  and  the  legislators 
now  and  then  ominously  mutter  that  they  would  like  to  remove  all  the  govern- 
mental machinery  from  Atlanta  back  to  the  old  governmental  seat ;  but  the 
Atlanta  influence  is  powerful  against  such  a  movement. 

The  deft  and  graceful  pen  of  that  sprightly  and  distinguished  Georgian 
poet,  Mr.  Paul  H.  Hayne,  is  fitter  than  mine  to  paint  aright  the  charms  of  the 
Georgia  lowland  scenery.  To  a  poet's  verse  belong  the  inexpressible  charms  of 
the  dark  green  and  sombre  foliage,  the  hurry  of  waters  on  the  white,  low  beaches, 
the  sighing  of  the  wind  through  the  long  and  dainty  moss-beards,  and  the 
magical  effects  of  sunrise  and  moonrise  on  the  broad  and  placid  current  of  the 
Savannah.  To  verse  belong  the  many  stories  and  legends  of  the  chain  of  fertile 
islands  strung  along  the  Georgian  coast, 
from  Tybee  to  Cumberland.  These 
island  plantations  have  been  fast  falling 
into  decay  since  the  close  of  the  war, 
and  the  culture  of  sea-island  cotton  on 
them  has  experienced  many  sad  re- 
verses. The  war  left  its  scars  on  these 
islands.  The  Union  troops  seized  Ty- 
bee, near  the  mouth  of  the  Savannah, 
as  early  as  1862,  and  from  it  bombarded 
that  superb  fortification,  Fort  Pulaski, 
on  Cockspur  Island.  The  massive  walls 
of  Pulaski,  on  which  the  United  States 

had    lavished    money   and    skill,    Only   tO  The  old  Fort  on  Tybee  Island,  Georgia. 

find  it  turned  against  them,  yielded  to  the  terrible  summons  hurled  at  them 
from  the  mouths  of  rifled  cannon  and  mortars ;  and  the  battered  stones  loom 
up  to-day,  a  sad  memorial  to  the  passer-by  on  the  river  of  the  havoc  wrought 
by  civil  war. 

Journeying  along  the  coast,  one  passes  Warsaw  Sound,  where  the  plucky 
little  monitors  captured  the  iron-clad  "Atlanta"  in  1863;  and  a  sail  up  the 
Ogeechee  river  will  bring  one  to  the  scene  of  the  brave  defense  of  Fort  McAl- 
lister, whose  little  garrison,  stirred  by  a  sense  of  duty,  held  grimly  on,  long  after 
Sherman  was  at  the  gates  of  Savannah  with  a  victorious  army,  and  the  Union 
fleet  kept  the  coast  blockaded — long  after  they  had  been  cut  off  from  all  hope 
of  relief;  held  on  until  captured  and  literally  crushed  down  by  overwhelm- 
ing numbers.  The  many  lagoons  which  penetrate  the  low  and  fertile  lands 
are  easily  accessible,  and  on  the  islands  there  will  in  future  be  delightful  homes, 
when  a  fresh  and  numerous  population  shall  have  come  to  a  State  whose 
only  need  is  more  people.      The  Atlantic  coast  of  Georgia,  seen  from  the  deck 


376 


CUMBERLAND      ISLAND FERNANDINA. 


of  an  ocean  steamer,  seems  low  and  uninteresting, — only  a  few  sand-hillocks 
now  and  then  looming  above  the  level  of  the  waves, — but  a  nearer  approach 
shows  luxuriant  vegetation  and  enviable  richness  of  soil.  From  Fernandina,  in 
North-western  Florida,  one  can  easily  reach  Cumberland  Island,  the  old  home 
of  -General  Henry  Lee  of  revolutionary  fame,  and  the  scene  of  sharp  fighting 
between  British  and  Americans  in  1815.  On  this,  as  on  the  neighboring  islands, 
the  orange  grows  luxuriantly,  and,  with  a  return  to  careful  and  thorough  culture, 
the  cotton  crop  there  could  be  made  of  immense  value. 

Fernandina  is  a  fine  old  seaport,  with  a  land-locked  harbor  in  which  more 
than  300  square-rigged  vessels  were  anchored  at  one  time  during  the  war  of 
18 1 2.  The  largest  ships  can  unload  without  difficulty  at  its  excellent  wharves, 
and  vessels  from  all  climes  come  there  to  load  with  the  lumber  which  is  the  main 
article  of  export.  The  sugar  and  cotton  plantations,  and  the  orange  groves  in 
the  vicinity  were  highly  prosperous  before 'the  war.  The  beach,  eighteen  miles 
long,  affords  delightful  drives,  and  many  Northern  visitors  remain  in  the  ven- 
erable town  throughout  the  winter  months.  Fernandina  is  the  seat  of  the  Epis- 
copal bishopric  of  Florida,  and  the  bishop  there  has  charge  of  a  flourishing 
academy  for  young  ladies. 


Happiness. 


XL. 


THE     JOURNEY      TO      FLORIDA  —  THE      PENINSULA'S      HISTORY. 

JACKSONVILLE. 


I  ENTERED  Florida  on  a  frosty  morning.  Thin  flakes  of  ice  had  formed  in 
the  little  pools  along  the  railway's  sides,  and  the  Northern  visitors  in  the 
Pullman  car  shrouded  themselves  in  their  traveling-blankets  and  grumbled 
bitterly.      Here  and  there,  in  the  forests'  gaps,  the  negroes  had  kindled  huge 


Moonlight  over  Jacksonville,  Florida. 


fires,  and  were  grouped  about  them,  toasting  their  heads  and  freezing  their 
backs.  Now  and  then  we  caught  glimpses  of  beautiful  thickets ;  we  passed  long 
stretches  of  field  carpeted  with  thick  growths  of  palmetto  ;  with  intervening  pine- 
barrens,  and  freight  platforms  of  logs. 

It  is  263  miles  by  the  present  rail  route  from  Savannah  to  Jacksonville,  the 
chief  city  of  Florida,  and  the  rendezvous  for  all  travelers  who  intend  to  penetrate 
to  the  interior  of  the  beautiful  peninsula.  The  train  traverses  the  distance  at  the 
comfortable  speed  of  twelve  miles  an  hour;  from  time  to  time,  half  an  hour  is 
consumed  in  wooding  up, — an  operation  performed  in  the  most  leisurely  manner 


378  THE      RAIL     ROUTE     TO     FLORIDA. 

by  the  negroes, — and  one  arrives  in  Jacksonville  after  a  night's  travel.  The  cur- 
rents of  Northern  comers  pour  in  by  three  great  streams — the  Atlantic  and 
Gulf  rail  route  from  Savannah,  the  outside  steamers  from  Charleston,  which 
ascend  the  St.  John's  river  as  far  as  Palatka,  and  the  inland  route  from  Savannah, 
which  conducts  the  traveler  along  a.  series  of  estuaries  and  lagoons  between  the 
fertile  sea  islands  and  the  main-land. 

By  the  first  of  these  routes,  one  passes  but  few  towns  of  importance. 
Neither  at  Live  Oak,  the  junction  where  one  reaches  the  Jacksonville,  Pensacola 
and  Mobile  railroad,  nor  at  Wellborn,  nor  at  Lake  City,  is  there  anything  to 
answer  to  one's  ideas  of  the  typical  Florida  town.  The  rail  route  passes  Olustee, 
the  site  of  a  fierce  engagement  in  February,  1864,  between  Federals  and  Con- 
federates, in  which  the  former  were  defeated.  At  Baldwin  one  comes  to  the 
Florida  railroad,  grappled  to  Fernandina,  northward,  on  the  Atlantic,  and 
stretching  away  through  Duval,  Bradford,  Alachua,  and  Leroy  counties  to  Cedar 
Keys,  on  the  Gulf  coast. 

When  we  reached  Jacksonville  the  frost  had  vanished,  and  two  days  there- 
after the  genial  December  sun  bade  the  thermometer  testify  to  80  degrees  in  the 
shade.  Here  and  there  we  saw  a  tall  banana,  whose  leaves  had  been  yellowed 
by  the  frost's  breath ;  but  the  oranges  were  unscathed,  and  the  Floridians 
content. 

Pause  with  me  at  the  gateway  of  the  great  peninsula,  and  reflect  for  a  moment 
upon  its  history.  Fact  and  fancy  wander  here  hand  in  hand ;  the  airy  chronicles 
of  the  ancient  fathers  hover  upon  the  confines  of  the  impossible.  The  austere 
Northerner  and  the  cynical  European  have  been  heard  to  murmur  incredulously 
at  the  tales  of  the  modern  writers  who  grow  enthusiastic  upon  the  charms  of  our 
new  winter  paradise.  Yet,  what  of  fiction  could  exceed  in  romantic  interest  the 
history  of  this  venerable  State  ?  What  poet's  imagination,  seven  times  heated, 
could  paint  foliage  whose  splendors  should  surpass  that  of  the  virgin  forests  of 
the  Oclawaha  and  Indian  rivers  ?  What  "fountain  of  youth"  could  be  imagined 
more  redolent  of  enchantment  than  the  "  Silver  Spring,"  now  annually  visited  by 
50,000  tourists  ?  The  subtle  moonlight,  the  perfect  glory  of  the  dying  sun  as  he 
sinks  below  a  horizon  fringed  with  fantastic  trees,  the  perfume  faintly  borne  from 
the  orange  grove,  the  murmurous  music  of  the  waves  along  the  inlets,  and  the 
mangrove-covered  banks,  are  beyond  words. 

"  Canst  thou  copy  in  verse  one  chime 
Of  the  woodbell's  peal  and  cry  ? 
Write  in  a  book  the  morning's  prime, 
Or  match  with  words  that  tender  sky?" 

Our  American  Italy  has  not  a  mountain  within  its  boundaries.  Extending 
from  25  degrees  to  31  degrees  north  latitude,  it  has  an  area  of  60,000  square 
miles.  Nearly  400  miles  in  length,  it  has  the  latitude  of  Northern  Mexico,  the 
desert  of  Sahara,  Central  Arabia,  Southern  China,  and  Northern  Hindostan ;  but 
its  heats  are  tempered  by  the  Gulf  of  Mexico  on  the  one  hand,  and  the  Gulf 
Stream,  which  flows  along  the  eastern  coast  for  300  miles,  on  the  other.     Over 


THE      FLOWERY      PENINSULA  —  ITS      HISTORY.  379 

the  level  breadth  of  ninety  miles  between  these  two  waters  constantly  blow  odor- 
ous and  health-giving  ocean  winds,  and  under  their  influence  and  that  of  the 
genial  sun  springs  up  an  almost  miraculous  sub-tropical  vegetation.  It  is  the 
home  of  the  palmetto  and  the  cabbage  palm,  the  live  oak  and  the  cypress,  the 
mistletoe  with  its  bright  green  leaves  and  red  berries,  the  Spanish  moss,  the 
ambitious  mangrove,  the  stately  magnolia,  the  smilax  china,  the  orange,  the 
myrtle,  the  water-lily,  the  jessamine,  the  cork-tree,  the  sisal-hemp,  the  grape,  and 
the  cocoanut.  There  the  Northerner,  wont  to  boast  of  the  brilliant  sunsets  of  his 
own  clime,  finds  all  his  past  experiences  outdone.  In  the  winter  months,  soft 
breezes  come  caressingly ;  the  whole  peninsula  is  carpeted  with  blossoms,  and  the 
birds  sing  sweetly  in  the  untrodden  thickets.  It  has  the  charm  of  wildness,  of 
mystery ;  it  is  untamed ;  civilization  has  not  stained  it.  No  wonder  the  Indian 
fought  ferociously  ere  he  suffered  himself  to  be  banished  from  this  charming  land. 

The  beautiful  peninsula  has  been  the  ambition  of  many  nationalities.  First 
came  the  hardy  Venetian,  Cabot,  to  whose  father  Henry  the  Seventh  accorded  the 
right  to  navigate  all  seas  under  the  English  flag.  In  1497,  groping  blindly, 
doubtless,  like  his  father  before  him,  for  the  passage  to  Cathay,  Cabot  touched  at 
Florida.  Early  in  the  sixteenth  century  came  Ponce  de  Leon,  the  chimerical  old 
Governor  of  Porto  Rico,  who  vainly  sought  in  the  recesses  of  the  peninsula  for 
the  fabled  "  Fountain  of  Youth,"  and  perished  in  a  broil  with  the  savages.  To 
him  our  gratitude  is  due  for  the  name  which  the  fair  land  has  kept  through  all 
the  changes  of  domination  which  have  fallen  to  its  lot.  During  his  second  search 
after  the  treasure,  landing  on  Palm  Sunday,*  amid  groves  of  towering  palm-trees, 
and  noting  the  profusion  of  flowers  everywhere,  the  pious  knight  christened  the 
country  "Florida."  After  him  came  other  Spaniards,  bent  on  proselyting 
Indians  by  kidnapping  and  enslaving  them ;  but  speedy  vengeance  fell  on  these 
ignoble  fellows ;  the  Indians  massacred  them  by  scores.  Then  Narvaez,  and  the 
Spaniards  in  his  train,  waded  through  the  dangerous  lagoons  and  dreary  swamps, 
fought  the  Indians  from  behind  breastworks  made  of  rotten  trees,  and  finally 
perished  in  storms  along  the  treacherous  coast.  Nothing  daunted,  and  fresh 
from  triumphs  in  other  lands,  'De  Soto  followed,  overrunning  with  his  army  the 
vast  extent  of  territory  which  the  Spaniards  claimed  under  the  name  of  Florida, 
and  which  extended  from  the  Chesapeake  to  the  Tortugas. 

The  definite  settlement  of  Florida  by  Europeans  was  consecrated  by  a 
massacre,  by  which  the  fanatical  Spaniard  added  fresh  infamy  to  his  already 
tarnished  name.  When  Coligny  had  received  from  Charles  the  Ninth  of  France 
permission  to  found  a  colony  upon  the  peninsula,  and  Ribault's  expedition  had 
erected  a  monument  near  the  mouth  of  the  St.  John's  river,  ere  sailing  to  found 
the  settlement  at  Port  Royal,  the  Spaniards  were  enraged ;  and  as  soon  as,  in 
1564,  Laudonniere's  expedition  had  founded  Fort  Caroline  on  a  little  eminence 
a  few  miles  from  the  mouth  of  the  St.  John's  (then  called  the  river  May),  active 
hostilities  were  begun  by  Spain.  The  counter  expedition  of  Menendez  de  Avila 
resulted  in  the  massacre  of  all  the  Huguenots  at  Fort  Caroline ;  and  the  grim 
Spaniards  placed  an  inscription  on  the  spot  stating  that  "  the  murdered  ones  had 

*  In  Spanish,  Pascua  Florida. 


38O  PERTURBED      COLONIAL      EXISTENCE      OF      FLORIDA. 

been  slain,  not  as  Frenchmen,  but  as  heretics."  Two  years  later  came  Nemesis, 
in  the  person  of  the  brave  Protestant  Chevalier,  Dominique  de  Gourgues  of 
France,  who  relentlessly  slew  the  Spaniards  settled  on  the  site  of  the  old  Fort 
Caroline,  and  hanged  many  of  them,  averring  by  an  inscription  above  them 
that  it  was  not  done  "  as  to  Spaniards,  but  to  traitors,  robbers,  and  murderers." 

The  town  which  Menendez  established  on  the  site  of  the  Indian  village  of 
Seloo,  and  which  he  named  St.  Augustine,  was  the  first  permanent  European 
settlement  in  North  America.  In  the  eighteenth  century  the  British  gained 
possession  of  Florida.  The  American  colonists  had  already  unsuccessfully  tried 
to  gain  St.  Augustine;  but  were  destined  to  wait  a  century  longer.  In  1781 
the  English  lost  their  hold,  and  the  territory  reverted  to  Spain,  only  to  be  pur- 
chased by  the  United  States  in  18 19,  after  Fernandina  and  Pensacola  had  been 
taken  by  American  arms.  Ceded  and  re-ceded,  sacked  and  pillaged,  languishing 
undeveloped  through  a  colonial  existence  of  200  years,  shocked  to  its  centre  by 
terrible  Indian  wars,  and  plunged  into  a  war  of  secession  at  the  moment  when  it 
was  hoping  for  rest  and  stability,  the  lovely  land  seems  indeed  to  have  been  the 
prey  of  a  stern  yet  capricious  fate. 

It  is  not  wonderful,  in  view  of  the  perturbed  condition  of  the  peninsula,  since 
its  discovery,  that  to-day  it  has  hardly  more  than  a  quarter  of  a  million  of  inhab- 
itants, and  that  its  rich  lands  remain  untilled.  The  weight  of  the  slave  system 
kept  it  down,  after  the  Government  of  the  United  States  had  guaranteed  it 
against  the  wonted  invasions  and  internal  wars ;  the  remoteness  from  social 
centres  enforced  by  the  plantation  life  made  its  populations  careless  of  the  enter- 
prise and  thrift  which  characterize  a  country  filled  with  rich  and  thriving  towns ; 
and  the  few  acres  which  were  tilled  were  forced  to  exhaustion  by  the  yearly 
production  of  the  same  staple.  Now,  with  more  than  33,000,000  of  acres 
within  its  limits,  it  has  barely  3,000,000  partially  improved,  and  on  its  10,000 
farms  much  is  still  woodland.  Large  farms  and  plantations  have,  through- 
out the  State,  decreased,  and  small  ones  have  multiplied,  but  the  total  yearly 
value  of  farm  products  now  rises  hardly  above  $11,000,000  or  $12,000,000, 
while  the  value  of  its  home  manufactures  is  but  a  couple  of  hundred  thousand 
dollars.  With  1,100  miles  of  practicable  coast  line,  studded  with  excellent  bays, 
and  with  such  noble  navigable  rivers  as  the  St.  John's,  the  St.  Mary's,  the 
Appalachicola,  and  the  Suwanee,  it  is  strange  that  a  larger  commerce  has  not 
sprung  up  within  the  State  limits. 

We  will  not  be  too  statistical.  Imagine  yourself  transferred  from  the  trying 
climate  of  the  North  or  North-west  into  the  gentle  atmosphere  of  the  Floridian 
peninsula,  seated  just  at  sunset  in  an  arm-chair,  on  some  of  the  verandas  which 
overlook  the  pretty  square  in  Jacksonville.  Your  face  is  fanned  by  the  warm 
December  breeze,  and  the  chippering  of  the  birds  mingles  with  the  music  which 
the  negro  band  is  playing  in  yonder  portico.  The  lazy,  ne'er-do-well  negro 
boys  playing  in  the  sand  so  abundant  in  all  the  roads,  have  the  unconscious  pose 
and  careless  grace  of  Neapolitan  beggars.  Here  and  there  among  the  dusky 
race  is  a  face  beautiful  as  was  ever  that  of  olive-brown  maid  in  Messina.  This 
is  the  South,  slumbrous,  voluptuous,  round  and  graceful.      Here  beauty  peeps 


JACKSONVILLE     AND     THE     ST.     JOHN'S     RIVER. 


38l 


from  every  door-yard.     Mere  exist- 
ence is  pleasure ;   exertion  is  a  bore. 
Through    orange -trees    and    grand 
oaks    thickly  bordering   the    broad 
avenues  gleams  the  wide  current  of 
the  St.   John's  river.      Parallel  with 
it  runs  Bay  street,  Northern  in  ap- 
pearance,   with     brick     blocks     on 
either  side,  with  crowds  of  smartly 
dressed    tourists   hurrying    through 
it,  with  a   huge    "  National  Hotel," 
with    banks,    with    elegant    shops. 
Fine    shell    roads    run    out  beyond 
the  town  limits,  in  either  direction. 
Riding  toward   the    river's    mouth, 
which    is   twenty -five    miles  below 
the  town,   one    comes    to    marshes 
and     broad     expanses     of    luscious 
green    thicket.       Passing    the   long 
rows  of  steam  saw- mills, — Jackson- 
ville is  a  nourishing  lumber  port, — 
one  comes  to  the  point  of  debarca- 
tion    for    millions    of    feet   of    pine 
lumber,    shingles    and    staves,    and 
great    quantities    of   naval    stores. 
The  fleet  of  sailing  vessels  used  in 
this  trade  find   at   the   new  city  as 
fine    a    port    as    the    country    can 
boast. 

The  St.  John's,  at  Jacksonville, 
makes  a  crescent  bend,  not  unlike 
that  of  the  Mississippi  at  New 
Orleans.  Nearly  two  miles  broad 
directly  in  front  of  the  wharves,  it 
widens  to  an  expanse  of  six  miles  a 
little  way  above,  offering  superb 
opportunities  for  commerce.  The 
bar  at  its  mouth  is  nearly  always 
practicable  for  large  ocean  steam- 
ers, and  they  run  with  ease  to 
Palatka,  sixty  miles  above  Jackson- 
ville. The  journey  is  charming 
from  the  river's  mouth,  past  Baton 
island,  the  residence  of  the  hardy 
river    pilots,    and    the    site    of    two 


382  JACKSONVILLE  AS  A  WINTER  RESORT. 

excellent  light- houses;  past  the  mounds  of  oyster  -  shells,  through  which 
tangled  shrubbery  has  pierced  a  difficult  way ;  past  the  intensely  white  dunes, 
glistening  under  the  sun,  and  ghastly  and  weird  under  the  moonlight;  past 
the  little  eminence  known  as  St.  John's  Bluff,  the  location  of  old  Fort  Caroline, 
where  Menendez  massacred  the  unfortunate  Huguenots;  and  past  Yellow  Bluff, 
with  its  ancient  Spanish  ramparts.  Along  the  river- side,  on  elevated  ground 
beyond  the  commercial  part  of  the  town,  many  New  York  and  Boston  gentle- 
men have  erected  elegant  residences,  and  the  climate  has  already  seduced  them 
from  even  a  summer  allegiance  to  their  Northern  birthplaces.  The  view  from 
"  Riverside  "  is  charming. 

It  is  not  a  score  of  years  since  there  was  a  corn-field  on  the  site  of  Bay  street, 
now  the  chief  avenue  of  a  city  of  twelve  thousand  inhabitants.  Jacksonville  was 
once  known  as  "Cow  Ford."  There  the  "King's  Road,"  in  the  old  days,  crossed 
the  river,  and  connected  the  northern  settlements  with  St.  Augustine.  During 
the  war  it  ran  to  decay ;  it  was  strongly  fortified,  and  was  clung  to  desperately 
by  the  Confederates.  The  Union  troops  occupied  it  then  several  times,  and  on 
the  third  assault  a  fire  sprang  out,  which  did  much  damage.  At  the  close  of  the 
great  struggle,  the  grass  stood  waist-high  in  the  streets,  and  the  cattle  had  taken 
refuge  from  the  sun  in  the  deserted  houses.  But  the  North  has  swept  on  in  such 
a  resistless  current  that,  so  far  as  its  artificial  features  are  concerned,  the  city  has 
grown  up  according  to  the  New  England  pattern,  though  foliage,  climate,  sun — 
all  these  are  the  antipodes  of  those  of  the  North  ! 

A  good  many  people  fancy  that,  in  going  to  Florida,  they  are  about  to  absent 
themselves  from  all  the  accessories  of  civilization, —  that  they  must  undergo  con- 
siderable privation.  Nothing  could  better  correct  this  impression  than  a  stay  of 
a  few  days  in  Jacksonville.  Such  good  hotels  as  the  St.  James  and  the  National, 
such  well-ordered  streets,  such  charming  suburbs  as  "  Brooklyn "  and  "  River- 
side "  and  "  La  Villa  "  and  "  Wyoming,"  where  the  invalid  can  find  the  coveted 
repose  and  enjoy  the  delicious  climate ;  such  an  abundance  of  newspapers  and 
books,  of  carriages  and  saddle-horses,  and  such  convenient  access  to  all  other 
desirable  points  along  the  great  river,  are  sufficient  to  satisfy  even  the  most 
querulous.  Jacksonville  is  filled  with  pleasant  houses  where  lodgings  are  let;  and 
from  December  until  April  its  population  is  doubled  ;  society  is  active ;  excur- 
sions, parties,  and  receptions  occur  almost  daily ;  gayety  rules  the  hour.  For  it 
is  not  invalids  alone  who  crowd  Florida  now-a-days,  but  the  wealthy  and  the  well. 
One-fourth  of  the  annual  visitors  are  in  pursuit  of  health ;  the  others  are  crusad- 
ing to  find  the  phantom  Pleasure.  Fully  one-half  of  the  resident  population  of 
Jacksonville  is  Northern,  and  has  settled  there  since  the  war.  The  town  boasts 
excellent  public  schools  for  white  and  black  children ;  the  Catholics  have  estab- 
lished educational  institutions  there,  and  there  are  several  fine  churches.  The 
winter  evenings  are  delightful.  In  the  early  days  of  December,  on  my  first  visit, 
the  mercury  during  the  day  ranged  from  79  to  80  degrees,  but  at  nightfall  sank 
to  70  degrees,  and  the  coOl  breeze  from  the  river  produced  a  most  delicious 
temperature. 


XLI. 


UP     THE     ST.      JOHN'S     RIVER — TOCOI — ST.      AUGUSTINE. 


THE  St.  John's  river  is  a  capricious  stream,  and  the  Indians  characterized  it 
for  its  waywardness  as  "Il-la-ka," — meaning  that  " it  had  its  own  way, 
which  was  contrary  to  every  other."  Its  actual  source  no  man  knows,  though  it 
seems  to  be  formed  by  a  myriad  of  small  streams  pouring  out  of  the  unexplored 
region  along  the  Indian  river.  It  is  four  hundred  miles  in  length,  and  here  and 
there  broadens  into  lakes  from  six  to  twelve  miles  wide.  The  banks  are  low  and 
flat,  but  bordered  with  a  wealth  of  exquisite  foliage  to  be  seen  nowhere  else  upon 
this  continent.  One  passes  for  hundreds  of  miles  through  a  grand  forest  of 
cypresses  robed  in  moss  and  mistletoe;  of  palms  towering  gracefully  far  above  the 
surrounding  trees,  of  palmettoes  whose  rich  trunks  gleam  in  the  sun  ;  of  swamp, 
white  and  black  ash,  of  magnolia,  of 
water  oak,  of  poplar,  and  of  plane- 
tree  ;  and,  where  hummocks  rise  a  few 
feet  above  the  water-level,  the  sweet 
bay,  the  olive,  the  cotton-tree,  the 
juniper,  the  red  cedar,  the  sweet  gum, 
the  live  oak,  shoot  up  their  splendid 
stems ;  while  among  the  shrubbery 
and  inferior  growths  one  may  note 
the  azalea,  the  sumach,  the  sensitive- 
plant,  the  agave,  the  poppy,  the  mal- 
low and  the  nettle.  The  vines  run 
not  in  these  thickets,  but  over  them. 
The  fox  grape  clambers  along  the 
branches,  and  the  woodbine  and  bign- 
onia  escalade  the  haughtiest  forest 
monarchs.  When  the  steamer  nears 
the  shore,  one  can  see  far  through  the 
tangled  thickets  the  gleaming  water 
out  of  which  rise  thousands  of  "  cy- 
press-knees," looking  exactly  like  so 
many  champagne  bottles  set  into  the 
current  to  cool.  The  heron  and  the  crane  saucily  watch  the  shadow  which 
the  approaching  boat  throws  near  their  retreat.  The  wary  monster- turtle  gazes 
for  an  instant,  with  his  black  head  cocked  knowingly  on  one  side,  then  disap- 
pears with  a  gentle  slide  and  a  splash.     An  alligator  grins  familiarly  as  a  dozen 


Residence  of  Mrs.  Harriet  Beecher  Stowe,  at  Mandarin, 
Florida.     [Page  386.] 


3§4 


UP     THE     ST.     JOHN'S     RIVER. 


revolvers  are  pointed  at  him  over  the  boat's  side,  suddenly  "winks  with  his  .tail," 
and  vanishes  !  as  the  bullet  meant  for  his  tough  hide  skims  harmlessly  over  the 
ripples  left  above  him. 

The  noble  stream  appears  of  a  dark  blue,  as  one  sails  along  it,  but,  taken  up 
in  a  glass,  the  water  is  of  a  light  coffee  color,  a  thin  scum  sometimes  rising  to  its 
surface.  Its  slightly  brackish  taste  is  accounted  for  by  the  fact  that  the  ocean 
tides  are  often  perceptible  as  far  up  as  Lake  George.  Many  insist  that  there  must 
be  springs  along  the  channel  of  the  river,  as  they  cannot  otherwise  account  for 
its  great  volume.  For  its  whole  length  of  four  hundred  miles,  it  affords  glimpses 
of  perfect  beauty.     One  ceases  to  regret  hills  and  mountains,  and  can  hardly 


Green  Cove  Springs,  on  the  St.  John's  River,  Florida.     [Page  386.] 

imagine  ever  having  thought  them  necessary,  so  much  do  these  visions  surpass 
them.  It  is  not  grandeur  which  one  finds  on  the  banks  of  the  great  stream, 
it  is  nature  run  riot.  The  very  irregularity  is  delightful,  the  decay  is  charming, 
the  solitude  is  picturesque.  The  bitter-sweet  orange  grows  in  wild  profusion 
along  the  St.  John's  and  its  tributary  streams;  thousands  of  orange-trees  demand 
but  transplanting  and  careful  culture  to  become  prolific  fruit-bearers. 

The  local  steamers  which  ascend  the  river  from  Jacksonville  regularly  leave 
the  wharves  at  eleven  in  the  morning,  though  advertised  for  nine,  as  it  has  been 
a  tradition,  time  out  of  mind,  that  they  shall  be  two  hours  late.  This  brace  of 
hours  will  be  well  spent  by  the  traveler,  however,  if  he  seats  himself  on  the  deck 
and  watches  the  proceedings  on  the  wharf.     A  multitude  of  drays,  driven  by 


FROM  JACKSONVILLE  TO  TOCOI.  385 

ragged  negroes,  come  and  go  incessantly,  bringing  every  conceivable  kind  of  mer- 
chandise and  household  goods ;  the  deck  hands  carry  piles  of  'lumber,  baskets  of 
eggs,  crates  of  crockery,  hoist  in  kicking  and  biting  mules,  toss  aboard  half-a- 
hundred  chickens  tied  by  the  legs ;  stow  aAvay  two  or  three  portable  houses  des- 
tined for  the  far  interior,  where  some  lone  lumbermen  are  felling  the  massive 
cypresses;  and  finally  fill  in  the  interstices  with  coal,  chains,  fertilizers,  salt  pork, 
garden  seeds,  mail-bags,  and  an  unimaginable  hodge-podge.  Meantime,  if  the 
boat  you  have  taken  be  her  favorite,  "Aunt  Rose,"  the  venerable  river  steward- 
ess,—  one  of  the  characters  along  the  Jacksonville  wharves, — has  danced  up  and 
down  the  gang-planks  a  hundred  times  with  various  letters  and  packages.  Even 
though  the  day  be  hot,  you  find  that  a  cool  breeze  comes  from  the  dense  thickets 
and  forests  bordering  the  current,  for  you  go  up  the  stream  at  a  rapid  pace  when 
at  last  the  little  craft  moves  off. 

It  used  to  be  said,  a  few  years  since,  that  the  St.  John's  banks,  from  its 
mouth  to  its  source,  were  strewn  with  the  wrecks  of  orange  groves.  After  the 
war,  hundreds  of  Northerners  who  knew  little  of  Florida  rushed  in,  dug  up  the 
wild  orange-trees  from  the  swamps,  and  transplanted  them  along  the  river  banks; 
leaving  them  with  the  firm  belief  that  they  would  care  for  themselves,  and  that, 
in  a  few  years,  golden  fortunes  would  hang  on  every  tree.  But  these  careless 
cultivators  were  doomed  to  bitter  disappointment;  hardly  any  of  them  succeeded. 
In  their  train,  however,  came  Northerners  who  made  a  study  of  the  culture,  and 
now  there  are  dozens  of  noble  groves  scattered  up  and  down  the  river,  and  a 
score  of  years  hence  the  perfume  of  the  orange  leaf  will  be  encountered  at  every 
point  along  the  stream. 

When  the  war  closed  there  was  not  a  wharf  left  on  the  river.  Federal  and 
Confederate  had  warred  and  wasted,  and  to-day  for  memento  there  lies  in  the 
stream,  some  distance  above  Jacksonville,  a  sunken  gun-boat,  its  engine  gear  just 
showing  above  the  waves.  Inquiring  of  a  venerable  Floridian  how  it  happened 
to  be  there,  I  was  informed  that  "  the  durned  Yankees'  shot  was  too  hot  for 
her." 

The  journey  from  Jacksonville  to  Tocoi  is  delightful,  though  one's  first  experi- 
ence of  the  great  river  has  a  zest  which  no  subsequent  one  can  rival.  Stemming 
the  current,  which,  under  the  brilliant  noonday  sunshine,  seems  a  sheet  of 
molten  silver,  the  steamer  passes  little  tugs,  drawing  in  their  train  immense  rafts 
of  cypress  and  pine  logs;  or  salutes,  with  three  loud  shrieks,  the  ponderous  "City 
Point"  or  " Dictator, "  from  Charleston.  The  cattle,  knee-deep  in  water,  are  feed- 
ing on  the  fresh  herbage  springing  from  the  sand-bars;  hundreds  of  little  fish  are 
leaping  out  of  the  current  and  falling  back  again,  their  shining  bodies  coquettishly 
bent  as  if  they  were  making  mock  of  the  sun.  Sometimes  the  boat  enters  a 
pleasant  inlet,  where  the  pines  on  the  shores  have  cut  across  the  "  hummock  " 
and  stand  quaintly  draped  in  Spanish  moss,  as  if  they  had  come  to  be  baptized. 
Fifteen  miles  from  Jacksonville,  on  the  eastern  shore,  is  the  pretty  town  of  Man- 
darin, so  called  from  the  culture  there  of  that  variety  of  the  orange.  Through 
the  trees  gleam  white  cottages.  Orange  groves,  with  the  golden  fruit  glistening 
among  the  dark  leaves,  come  to  the  very  water's  edge.     There,  in  winter,  lives 


386  MANDARIN  —  MAGNOLIA  —  GREEN     COVE     SPRINGS. 

Mrs.  Harriet  Beecher  Stowe,  besieged  by  hundreds  of  visitors,  who  do  not  seem 
to  understand  that  she  is  not  on  exhibition.  Mandarin  was  once  the  scene  of  a 
dreadful  Indian  massacre ;  a  generation  ago,  the  Seminoles  fell  upon  it  and  mas- 
sacred all  within  its  limits. 

"Hibernia,"    on    its    island,  with   a  lovely  promenade  under  the    sheltering 
branches  of  live  oaks,  and  "Magnolia,"  where  a  large  establishment  was  erected 


On  the  Road  to  St.  Augustine,  Florida. 

especially  for  invalids  many  years  ago,  and  is  now  very  successfully  conducted, 
are  on  the  right,  as  you  ascend,  and  are  much  frequented  by  Northerners.  Oak 
forests  border  the  water,  and  pines  and  palmettoes  form  a  striking  background. 
Throughout  the  winter  months  these  health-resorts  have  the  climate  of  Indian 
summer,  and  at  Green  Cove  Spring,  just  above  Magnolia,  where  there  are 
sulphur  waters  of  peculiar  healing  virtues  in  rheumatism  and  dyspepsia,  a  goodly 
company  usually  assembles  with  the  first  advent  of  "the  season."  Crossing  the 
river  to  Picolata,  a  wharf  with  a  prospective  town,  the  steamer  follows  the  eastern 
bank  until  it  arrives  at  Tocoi,  whence  an  extempore  horse-railway  conducts  the 
traveler  to  St.  Augustine.  The  traveler  was  formerly  condemned  to  journey 
from  Picolata  to  St.  Augustine,  over  a  terrible  road,  through  cypress  clumps  and 
masses  of  briars,  and  palmettoes,  in  a  species  of  volante,  in  which  his  bones 
were  so  racked  that  he  rarely  recovered  before  it  was  time  to  make  the  journey 
again. 

It  is  expected  that  a  railroad  will  one  day  penetrate  the  country  between 
Jacksonville  and  St.  Augustine,  and  following  the  coast  as  far  as  Cape  Sable,  be 


THE     ROUTE     TO     ST.     AUGUSTINE. 


387 


conducted  over  trestles  to  Key  West,  thus  placing  Cuba  within  three  or  four 
hours'  sail.  The  road  could  be  built  for  a  comparatively  small  sum,  as  it  would 
run  through  an  absolutely  level  country. 

But  that  road  would  rob  good  old  St.  Augustine  of  its  romance.  I  object  to 
it  on  that  account ;  and  so,  I  am  sure,  will  many  hundred  others.  What !  must 
we  lose  the  pleasure  of  arriving  at  nightfall  at  the  Sebastian  river,  and  hearing 
the  cheery  horn  sounded  as  we  dash  through  the  quaint  streets,  and  alight  at  the 
hostelry  ?  A  bas  the  railroad !  rather  let  us  have  the  diligence,  the  mules  with 
tinkling  silver  bells,  the  broad  -  hatted,  velvet -jacketed  drivers  of  primitive 
Spain. 

Useless — vain — these  protestations ;  as*  I  stand  on  the  wharf,  at  Tocoi,  I 
can  see  that  modernism  is  already  here.  A  horse-car !  Ye  guardians  of  the 
venerable  ! 

Out  through  a  seemingly  interminable  forest  leads  a  straight  road,  bordered 
here  by  pines,  and  there  by  the  palmettoes  which  spring  in  dense  beds  from  the 
rolling  ground.  There  is  a  little  group  of  houses  at  Tocoi,  and  along  the  river 
bank,  under  the  shade  of  the  beautiful  moss-hung  oaks,  several  Northerners  have 
established  charming  homes.  A  few  miles  back  from  the  river,  on  either  side,  are 
good  sugar-lands,  and  the  negroes  about  the  station  are  munching  stalks  of  cane. 
An  old  mill  near  by  is  half-buried  under  a  wilderness  of  tropical  vegetation.  At 
intervals  in  the  forest,  palm-trees  shoot  up  their  slender,  graceful  trunks. 


A  Street  in  St.  Augustine,  Florida.     [Page  388.] 


It  is  eighteen  miles  from  Tocoi  to  St.  Augustine.  The  journey  is  made 
partly  on  iron,  partly  on  wooden  rails ;  but  is  comfortable,  and  affords  one  an 
excellent  chance  to  see  a  veritable  Florida  back-country.     There  is  not  a  house 


388 


ST.     AUGUSTINE      BY     NIGHT. 


along  the  route;  hardly  a  sign  of  life.      Sometimes  the  roll  of  the  wheels  startles 
an  alligator  who  has  been  napping  on  the  track ;   and  once,  the  conductor  says 
they  found  two  little  brown  bears  asleep  in  the  run  directly  in  their  path       It  is 
night  ere  you  approach  the  suburbs  of  the  old  city      The  vegetation  takes  on  a 
ghostly  aspect;   the  black  swamp  canal  over  which  the  vehicle  passes  sends  up  a 
fetid  odor  of  decay;   the  palm  thickets  under  the  moonlight  in  the  distance  set 
one  to  tropical  imaginings.      Arrived  at  the  Sebastian  river,  an  arm  of  the  sea 
flowing  in  among  long  stretches  of  salt-marsh  clad  in  a  kind  of  yellowish  grass 
and  inhabited  by  innumerable  wild  fowl  that  make  the  air  rin<x  with  their  cries' 
the  horse-car  stops,  you  are  transferred  to  an  omnibus,   brown-skinned  Minor- 
cans  and  French  touters  for  hotels  surround  you ;  the  horn  sounds  ta-ra  -  ta-ra- 
ta-ra  !  and  you  rattle  through  the  streets  to  the  hotel. 


St  Augustine,  Plorida — "An 


ancient  gateway." 


There  >s  no.no.se  in  the  town;  evening  has  brought  with  it  profound  quiet 
As  for  me  alighting  at  the  "  Magnolia,"  in  a  street  as  narrow  as  any  in  Valencia 
or  Genoa  I  strol ,  after  supper,  into  the  dark  and  mysterious  lane,     Th^oon 
ess  nigh :  „  klndly     it  lends  the  proper  wdrdness_the  ^  ~«" 

thrown  about  St.  Augustine.     Walking  in  the  middle  of  the  street,  which  is  over 
hung  by  wide  projeetmg  balconies,- 1  detect  a  murmur,  as  of  far-off  music_a  soft 

si  IZX  "^'T^     ^  **  '  W  h  ***■  ™^  *  is  *e  *yTm  of  the 
sea  and  the  warm  breeze  which  blew  across  my  face  had  a  smell  of  the  ocean 
There  ,s  plamly  the  sound  of  water  lapping  on  the  shore.     Ah!  here  is    t  half ' 

^ts,Tdg\om1^1™rivinesWwhhicah  T^f  !tT(  ^"^ 
creeping  about  ^decaying  wlndowl ! "  A  JMe&^r of  an  'opetplat-aTo. 
here  an  ancient  gateway,  with  a  fragment  of  a  high  wall  adjoining^     to  Te 


THE     SEA-WALL — THE     PLAZA. 


389 


right-looming  up  through  the  shadows  at  a  little  distance-the  massive  walls 
and  mauresque  towers  of  an  antique  fortress.  Yonder  is  the  beach,  and,  as  I 
draw  near  to  it,  I  see  two  or  three  stalwart  figures  pulling  in  a  boat 

I  turn  again,  and  wander  through  other  streets,  Hypohta,  Bay,  Ireasury 
Lane  Some  of  the  little  alleys  are  barely  eight  feet  wide.  Where  is  the  bravo 
with  his  dagger?  Not  here.  St.  Augustine  is  most  peaceable  of  towns.  No 
moss-grown  corner  of  Europe,  asleep  these  two  hundred  years,  shall  boast  a 
steadier  population  than  this— our  oldest  town  in  the  United  States. 

Here  is  a  sea-wall  wide  enough  to  walk  upon.  Against  it  the  waves  are 
gently  beating.  The  fort  yonder  seems  now  but  a  great  blot  on  the  sky.  I  come 
to  the  Plaza,  a  little  park  in  the  city's  midst.  A  few  fishermen,  a  soldier  or  two, 
and  some  visitors  are  lazily  reclining  on  the  benches  opposite  the •  venerabk 
Cathedral.  A  tall  white  monument  stands  in  the  park's  centre.  I  light  a  match, 
and  climb  the  pedestal. 

Plaza    de    la    Coxstituciox. 

Monument  to  one  of  the  short-lived  forms  of  government  in  Spain.      Nothing 

but  a  plain  shaft.  .  _ 

Now  every  one  has  left  the  square.     There  are  no  lights,  no  voices.      So  I  go 

home  to  bed.  "  .       , 

Morning,  in  mid-December,  brings  warmth  and  sunhght;  noon,  slumbrous 
heat  Still  roaming  in  the  quiet  streets,  I  see  few  signs  of  activity.  Hammers 
are  ringing  on  the  walls  of  the  new  wooden  hotel  in  which  Northern  tourists  are 
to  be  lodged,  a  splendid  coquina  wall,  which  might  have  stood  for  another 
century  having  been  torn  down  to  make  room  for  this  ephemeral  box.  The  old 
arch,  which  marked  the  site  of  the  Treasury,  is  crumbling,  and  will  soon  vanish. 
The  quondam  residence  of  the  Spanish  Governors,  on  the  west  side  of  the  Plaza, 
has  been  rebuilt  and  altered  until  there  is  nothing  antique  in  its  appearance.  It 
is  now  a  prosaic  court-house  and  post-office,  and  around  its  doors  daily  gather 
swarms  of  Northern  tourists  awaiting  their  mail.  The  balconies  of  the  huge  bt 
Augustine  Hotel  are  crowded  at  evening  when  the  band  of  the  crack  artillery 
regiment  plays. 


XLII. 

ST.     AUGUSTINE,     FLORIDA  —  FORT     MARION. 

ST.  AUGUSTINE,  which  a  proud  Spanish  monarch  once  called  the  "  Siem- 
pre  fiel  Ciudad,"  is  situated  on  the  eastern  coast  of  Florida.  The  town  is 
built  on  a  small  peninsula  between  the  St.  Sebastian  river  and  the  harbor. 
Menendez  drew  the  attention  of  the  Spanish  nation  to  the  spot  by  landing  there 
in  1565  ;  by  his  joyous  return  to  the  little  garrison  there,  and  his  reception  by 
the  priesthood,  who  glorified  him  for  the  zeal  he  had  displayed,  after  the  massacre 
of  the  Huguenots  at  Fort  Caroline ;  and  by  the  subsequent  bloody  deeds  among 
the  dunes  of  Anastasia  Island,  at  Matanzas  Inlet.  Menendez,  finding  that 
Ribault's  Huguenots  had  been  wrecked  near  this  inlet,  went  to  them  with  seem- 
ing protestations  of  friendship.  He  heard  their  pitiable  story ;  how  they  had  lost 
four  galleons  in  the  mighty  storm,  and  that  other  vessels  were  missing;  how  they 
desired  boats  with  which  to  traverse  the  inlet,  and  to  pass  through  St.  Augustine 
on  their  way  to  a  fort  "which  they  had  twenty  leagues  from  there."  Menendez 
was  too  thorough  a  scoundrel  and  too  little  of  a  gentleman  to  declare  open  war 
against  them,  but  he  announced  boldly  that  he  had  massacred  the  garrison  and 
destroyed  the  fort.  Then  they  desired  that  he  should  enable  them  to  return  to 
France,  since  "the  kings  of  Spain  and  of  France  were  brothers  and  friends." 
But  Menendez  told  them  that,  as  they  were  of  the  new  sect,  he  held  them  for 
enemies,  and  if  they  would  throw  themselves  upon  his  mercy  he  would  do  zvith 
them  what  God  should  of  His  mercy  direct.  Thus,  having  shifted  the  responsi- 
bility of  his  crime  from  himself  to  his  Maker,  he  enticed  the  unfortunate  French- 
men into  his  clutches,  and,  after  tying  their  hands,  his  soldiers  massacred  every 
one  of  them.  As  the  two  hundred  and  eight  prisoners  came,  one  by  one,  into  a 
lonely  place  among  the  sand-hills,  they  were  poignarded  and  stricken  down  by 
the  swords  of  their  treacherous  and  murderous  assailants.  It  is  not  strange  that 
the  Floridian  should  to  this  day  speak  of  the  "bloody  Matanzas  river." 

But  this  was  not  all.  On  the  very  next  day  after  the  massacre,  the  Spaniards, 
who  had  returned  to  St.  Augustine,  learned  that  large  numbers  of  Frenchmen 
had  been  seen  "  at  the  same  part  of  the  river  as  the  others  had  been."  This  was 
Ribault  himself,  with  the  remains  of  his  shipwrecked  company.  The  Adelantado, 
Menendez  the  infamous,  at  once  pushed  forward  to  meet  them.  A  conference 
was  had ;  the  Frenchmen  were  shown  the  dead  bodies  of  their  comrades,  and 
grimly  directed  to  surrender  to  the  clemency  of  the  noble  hidalgos.  Terrified 
and  shocked,  starving  and  without  any  means  of  escape,  Ribault  surrendered 
himself  and   150  of  the   men-at-arms  with  him,  as  well  as  the  royal  standards, 


MENENDEZ MATANZAS THE  SEA- WALL. 


391 


The  Remains  of  a  Citadel  at  Matanzas  Inlet. 


into  the  hands  of  Menendez.  Two  hundred  of  Ribault's  men,  well  knowing  the 
fate  in  store  for  them,  had  braved  the  horrors  of  the  wilderness  during  the  night, 
preferring  them  to  Spanish  "clemency."  Ribault  and  the  others  who  surren- 
dered, save  sixteen  persons,  were  ruthlessly  slaughtered. 

In  the  world's  history  there  is  recorded  no  more  infamous  massacre  than  this. 
The  two  hundred  who  fled  the  night  before  the  final  massacre  built  a  fort  at  some 
distance  from  St.  Augustine,  but  were 
finally  attacked  by  the  Spaniards,  and 
great  numbers  were  made  prisoners. 
Menendez  did  not  kill  them,  perhaps 
fearing  that  a  fourth  slaughter  would 
arouse  even  the  tardy  fury  of  the 
King  of  France,  but  pressed  them 
into  his  service. 

That  was  three  hundred  years  ago. 
The  remains  of  a  citadel  are  still  visible 
at  Matanzas  Inlet,  and  a  Government 
revenue  officer  keeps  as  regular  watch 
there  as  ever  did  Menendez,  but  not 
exactly  with  the  same  intent.  The 
first  fort  built  at  St.  Augustine  is  de- 
scribed by  the  ancient  chroniclers  as  built  of  logs,  and  it  is  said  to  have 
been  the  council -house  of  the  Indian  village,  on  which  site  the  town  is 
founded.  The  ruins  at  Matanzas  are  undoubtedly  more  ancient  than  any 
building   in    St.    Augustine. 

Menendez  went  to  his  reward  in  1574,  and  for  two  centuries  thereafter  the 
records  of  the  settlement  were  eventful.  Sir  Francis  Drake  attacked  and  burned 
it  in  1586-  the  buccaneers  now  and  then  landed  and  plundered  the  helpless 
inhabitants,  and  Indians  massacred  the  missionaries.  At  the  end  of  the  seven- 
teenth century  the  Spanish  Government  saw  that  the  sea  threatened  to  wash  away 
the  town,  and  for  half  a  century  thereafter  the  inhabitants  toiled  at  the  erection 
of  a  massive  sea-wall,  the  remains  of  which  may  now  be  seen  in  the  middle  of 
Bay  street,  and  which  has  been  superseded  by  the  fine  breakwater  built  by  the 
United  States  Government  between  1837  and  1843. 

At  the  beginning  of  the  eighteenth  century,  the  South  Carolinians  came  in 
hostile  array  against  St.  Augustine  by  land  and  sea.  The  siege  by  land  was  suc- 
cessful, the  attack  by  sea  was  a  fiasco,  and  the  invasion  failed  after  having  cost 
South  Carolina  £6,000,  for  which  she  issued  promises  to  pay.  A  quarter  of  a 
century  later  the  Carolinians  raided  again  upon  the  old  town,  but  went  no  farther 
than  the  gates.  In  1740  Governor  Oglethorpe,  of  Georgia,  led  a  movement  of 
Georgians,  Carolinians  and  English  against  it ;  but  retired,  after  an  unsuccessful 
siege  and  bombardment.  Shortly  thereafter,  the  garrison  of  St.  Augustine 
retaliated,  and  attacked  the  English  settlements  in  Georgia  with  a  fo^idaWe 
force ;  it  was  profitless.  Back  came  Oglethorpe  in  1743,  carrying  fire  and  deatn 
to  the  very  walls  of  the  old  fort. 


392 


OLD     ST.     AUGUSTINE. 


At  the  time  of  Oglethorpe's  siege,  St.  Augustine  was  stoutly  walled  about 
and  intrenched,  with  salient  angles  and  redoubts.  On  the  principal  fort,  fifty- 
pieces  of  brass  cannon  were  mounted,  and  growled  defiance  across  a  moat  two 
score  feet  wide  to  any  enemy  prowling  beneath  the  walls.     There  were  twenty- 


view  of  Fort  Marion,  St  Augustine,  Florida.     [  Page  394, 


five  hundred  inhabitants — of  which  nearly  one-half  were  Spanish  soldiers.  Out- 
posts were  maintained  on  the  St.  John's  river,  and  scouts  quickly  brought 
intelligence  of  any  hostile  movement. 

England  obtained  the  province  of  Florida  by  treaty  in  1763,  and  when  the 
red-coats  came  to  St.  Augustine,  the  Spanish  inhabitants  nearly  all  left.  Many 
of  them  or  their  descendants,  however,  returned  when  the  English  had  decided  to 
get  rid  of  the  troublesome  colony,  and  recession  to  Spain  occurred  in  1783,  in 
exchange  for  the  Bahama  islands.  In  1821,  the  standard  of  Spain,  which  had 
been  raised  by  Menendez  and  his  men,  256  years  before,  over  St.  Augustine, 
was  hauled  down,   and  the  stars  and  stripes  were  raised  in  its  place. 

Since  then,  the  old  town  has  had  its  share  of  vicissitudes.  It  changed  hands 
three  times  during  our  civil  war. 

A  century  ago,  St.  Augustine  was,  in  general  plan,  very  much  as  it  is  now. 
The  "Governor's  official  residence,"  the  present  court-house,  has  lost  the  beau- 
tiful garden  which  surrounded  it ;  a  Franciscan  convent  stood  on  the  site  of 
the  artillery  barracks  of  to-day.  An  Indian  village  was  still  standing  upon  the 
little  peninsula  in  those  days,  and  to  the  town's  fortifications  had  been  added 
a  ditch,  along  whose  sides  were  planted  thick  rows  of  the  Spanish  bayonet, 
forming  an  almost  impenetrable  chevaux  de  frise"  The  outer  lines  of  defense 
can  still  be  traced.  The  gardens  surrounding  the  solidly  built  two-story  flat- 
roofed  houses  were  still  filled  with  fruit-trees,  as  the  Spaniards  had  left  them; 
the  fig,  pomegranate,  lemon,  lime,  orange,  guava  and  the  bergamot,  flourished 
then  as  now ;  and  over  the  lattices  great  vines  trailed,  bending  under  loads  of 
luscious  grapes. 


THE      TRANSFORMATION      OF     THE      HISTORIC      CITY. 


393 


The  romance  of  the  place  is  now  gradually  departing.  The  merry  proces- 
sions of  the  carnival,  with  mask,  violin  and  guitar,  are  no  longer  kept  up  with 
the  old  taste ;  the  rotund  figure  of  the  padre,  the  delicate  form  of  the  Spanish 
lady,  clad  in  mantilla  and  basquina,  and  the  tall,  erect,  brilliantly  uniformed  cav- 
aliers, are  gone;  the  "posy  dance,"  with  its  arbors  and,  garlands,  is  forgotten; 
and  the  romantic  suburbs  are  undergoing  a  complete  transformation. 

The  wealth  of  Northern  cities  is  erecting  fine  pleasure  houses,  surrounded 
with  noble  orchards  and  gardens,  and  in  a  few  years  there  will  be  as  many  villas 
as  at  Newport  within  a  half  hour's  drive  from  the  centre  of  St.  Augustine.  A 
brilliant  society  already  gathers  there  every  winter,  and  departs  reluctantly  when 
the  long  summer  heats  begin.  Although  the  majority  of  those  who  visit  the 
venerable  town  are  not  in  search  of  health  so  much  as  of  an  agreeable  climate, 
and  an  escape  from  the  annoyances  of  winter,  still,  the  preservation  of  health 
has  been  found  so  certain  in  the  genial  air  of  Florida,  that  hundreds  of  families 
have  determined  to  make  it  henceforth  their  winter  home. 

Those  invalids  who  cannot  endure  a  sea-air  would  do  well  to  avoid  St. 
Augustine,  and  seek  some  of  the  interior  towns ;  but  the  overworked  and 
careworn,  the  sufferers  from  nervous  disease,  can  find  speedy  relief  in  the  per- 
meating  influence    of    the    genial    sunshine,    which    continues    almost   uninter- 


«#s 


Light-house  on  Anastasia  Island,  near  St  Augustine,  Florida. 

ruptedly  throughout  the  winter  months.  In  December,  the  days  are  ordinarily 
bright  and  sunny,  a  salt  sea- wind  blowing  across  the  peninsula ;  from  ten  until 
four  o'clock,  one  can  sit  out  of  doors,  bathed  in  floods  of  delicious  light.  During 
my  stay  at  St.  Augustine,  in  December,  there  were  two  days  in  which  I  gave 
myself  completely  up  to  the  mere  pleasure  of  existence.     I  seemed  incapable 


394 


FORT      MARION, 


of  any  effort;  the  strange  fascination  of  the  antiquated  and  remote  fortress- 
town  was  upon  me.  The  sunshine  penetrated  to  every  corner  of  my  room. 
There  was  no  broad  and  unpleasant  glare — no  impertinent  staring  on  the  sun's 
part,  but  a  gladsome  light  which  I  have  never  seen  elsewhere.  I  walked  out 
at  noonday ;  the  town  seemed  transfigured :  the  shadows  thereon  from  the 
balconies,  from  the  date-trees,  from  the  thickets  of  roses,  were  mystical;  I  sat 
down  on  the  grass-grown  rampart  near  old  Fort  Marion,  and  (forgetting  the 
gnats)  let  the  gentle  sea-breeze  caress  my  temples,  and  memories  of  by-gone 
centuries  take  complete  possession  of  me.  At  that  moment,  the  rest  of  the 
world  seemed  as  remote  as  Paradise,  vague  as  Ilium,  foreign  as  the  Zendavesta. 

Falling,  at  last,  to  contemplation  of  the  ancient  fort,  I  could  not  repress  my 
indignation  as  I  remembered  that  when  there  was  talk  of  building  a  railroad  to 
St.  Augustine,  some  enterprising  company  wished  to  buy  and  demolish  the  quaint 


0 


View  of  the  Entrance  to  Fort  Marion,  St  Augustine,  Florida. 

landmark,  that  they  might  establish  a  railway  terminus  there.  Such  vandalism 
would  be  a  disgrace  to  us.  The  fort  should  be  tenderly  clung  to.  The 
more  moss-grown  it  becomes,  the  more  we  should  love  it.  It  is  a  grand  monu- 
ment. For  more  than  a  century  hundreds  of  men  toiled  in  the  quarries  on 
Anastasia  Island  and  along  the  bay  shore,  wresting  out  the  material  now  in  the 
massive  walls. 

Coquina,  of  which  the  fort  is  built,  is  a  kind  of  concretion  of  shell-fragments, 
often  very  beautiful.  This  formation  extends  along  the  Floridian  coast  for  more 
than  a  hundred  miles.  It  crumbles  when  exposed  for  a  very  long  time  to  the 
air,  but  rarely  falls  to  pieces.  Coquina  resists  a  bombardment  better  than  ordi- 
nary stone,  as  it  is  elastic  and  will  bend  before  the  fiery  messengers;  so  that  it  is 
quite  possible  that  Fort  Marion,  decaying  and  aged  though  it  seem,  would  stand 
the  broadsides  of  a  foreign  man-of-war  better  than  the  forts  which  have  been 
built  but  a  few  years. 

This  fort  is  built  after  Vauban's  principles,  in  the  form  of  a  trapezium,  with 
walls  twenty- one  feet  high  and   enormously  thick,  and  with  bastions  at  each 


THE     INTERIOR     OF     THE     FORT. 


395 


corner,  originally  named  after  St  Paul,  St.  Pierre,  etc.  The  Castle  of  San  Marco 
was  its  former  title.  On  it  the  Appalachean  Indians  labored  for  sixty  years. 
The  garrison  was  also  compelled  to  contribute  to  the  work,  and  convicts  were 
brought  from  far  Mexico  to  labor  in  the  quarries.  Thousands  of  hands  must 
have  been  employed  for  half  a  century  in  transporting  the  giant  blocks  across 
the  bay,  and  raising  them  to  position  in  the  thick  walls.  As  one  traverses  the 
draw-bridge,  coming  down  the  town,  he  sees  over  the  main  entrance  the  arms 
of  Spain,  with  the  globe  and  cross  above  them,  and  an  inscription  showing  that 
in  1756  Field-Marshal  Don  Alonzo  Fernando  Herrera,  then  "Governor  and  Cap- 
tain of  the  City  of  San  Augustin  de  la  Florida,"  finished  the  castle,  "  Don  Fer- 
nando Sixth  being  then  King  of  Spain." 

"San  Marco,"  now  Fort  Marion,  has  never  been  taken  by  a  besieging  enemy. 
It  is  a  noble  fortification,  requiring  one  hundred  cannon  and  a  thousand  men  as 
complement  and  garrison ;  and  it  has  been  so  strengthened  by  the  water-battery 
added  to  it  since  the  United  States  came  into  possession  that  it  is  a  very  formi- 
dable defense.  The  old  sergeant  in  charge  exhibits  the  interior  to  visitors.  You 
penetrate  the  cell  which  was  suddenly  discovered  some  years  ago  by  a  break  in 
a  wall,  and  which  the  Spaniards  had  con- 
cealed before  ceding  the  fort  to  our  Gov- 
ernment. In  this  cell  were  found  cages  in 
which  men  had  been  confined.  Torch  in 
hand,  the  sergeant  leads  you  through  the 
chapel  in  the  casemate,  to  the  cell  whence 
a  Seminole  chief  once  made  his  escape 
during  the  war  with  his  countrymen,  and 
mounts  with  you  to  the  breezy  promenade 
overlooking  the  water -battery,  flanked  at. 
either  end  by  the  little  Moorish  sentry- 
boxes  whence  the  men-at-arms  were  wont 
to  watch  the  forest  and  the  sea  for  the 
approach  of  the  enemies  who  came  so  fre- 
quently. The  moss-grown  and  discolored 
walls,  the  worn  coquina  slits,  the  gloomy 
corridors,  the  mysterious  recesses,  the 
grand  old  moat,  with  the  gigantic  walls 
above  it,  are  too  perfect  reminders  of  the 
past  to  be   allowed  to  perish.     The  vandal 

who  shall  destroy  Fort  Marion  will  deserve  \£B8P" 

banishment. 

The  cathedral  is  in  real  Spanish  style, 
and  although  it  is  neither  large  nor  im- 
posing, there  is  a  subtle  charm  about  its  gray  walls,  its  time- eaten  doorway, 
its  belfry  from  which  bell-notes  are  always  clanging.  On  Sunday  evenings, 
crowds  assemble  in  the  Plaza,  and  listen  to  the  sweet- voiced  choir  at  vespers, 
while  from  the  Episcopal  Church  across  the  way,  one  can  now  and  then  hear 


'The  old  sergeant  in  charge." 


396 


THE  CATHEDRAL THE  MINORCANS. 


The  Cathedral  — St  Augustine,   Florida. 


the  murmur  of  Protestant  song.     I  shall  not  soon  forget  the  startling  contrast 
which  I  observed  one  Sabbath  evening  in  the  Plaza.     The  cathedral  bells  tolled 

solemnly.  I  could  see,  in  the 
open  belfry,  three  bright-faced 
lads  striking  the  notes  on  the 
bells ;  while  out  from  under 
the  gray  portal  came  a  funeral 
procession, — the  young  aco- 
lytes in  their  long  robes  of  black 
and  white,  then  the  priests  and 
the  mourners,  strange,  dark- 
bearded  men,  and  dark-skinned 
women,  facing  in  sombre  fash- 
ion toward  the  little  cemetery. 
It  was  like  a  bit  out  of  the 
seventeenth  century.  Turning, 
I  saw,  on  the  Plaza's  other 
side,  the  congregation  leaving 
the  Episcopal  Church — hosts 
of  richly  dressed  ladies  chatting 
gayly  together;  the  row  of 
young  gentlemen  ranged  outside  to  criticise  the  belles  admiringly ;  an  army 
officer  passing,  and  touching  his  cap  with  lofty  courtesy ;  and  half-a-dozen 
Northerners  eagerly  discussing  the  latest  news  from  the  stock  market ; — this  was 
the    nineteenth    century    come    to    St.    Augustine. 

The  brown  maidens,  the  olive-colored  women  that  you  see  in  the  streets,  are 
the  descendants  of  that  colony  from  the  Minorcan  Islands,  which  one  Dr.  Turn- 
bull  induced  to  settle  on  the  coast,  at  a  place  called  New  Smyrna,  more  than 
a  hundred  years  ago.  Fourteen  hundred  persons  were  brought  out,  and  engaged 
in  the  culture  of  indigo,  which  then  commanded  an  enormous  price.  Turnbull 
succeeded  in  obtaining  absolute  control  over  the  defenseless  colonists,  cut  them 
off  from  all  communication  with  other  settlements,  and  was  rapidly  reducing 
them  to  a  condition  of  actual  slavery,  when  they  revolted,  but  in  vain  ;  and  it 
was  not  until  the  English  attorney- general  of  the  province  interfered  in  their 
behalf,  that  they  were  emancipated  from  Turnbull's  tyranny,  and  allowed  to 
remove  to  St.  Augustine,  where  they  and  their  descendants  have  now  been  a 
part  of  the  population  for  nearly  a  century.  Their  old  habits  and  customs, 
brought  from  the  islands,  are  rapidly  dying  out ;  and  the  dialect  songs  which 
Mr.  Bryant  heard  during  his  visit,  in  1843,  have  almost  entirely  disappeared. 
Many  of  the  women  are  extremely  beautiful  in  their  youth,  but  they  fade  early. 
The  men  are  bold,  hardy  fishermen,  Greek  and  Italian  in  type  and  robustness — 
while  the  women  have  much  of  the  delicacy  of  form  and  feature  of  their  American 
sisters. 

Much  as  one  may  fear  that  the  influx  of  Northern  fashion  may  rob  the  old  town 
of  its  chief  charm,  it  is  easy  to  see  that  a  delightful  watering-place  is  to  be  created. 


WINTER     LIFE     IN      ST.      AUGUSTINE.  397 

The  people  of  New  England,  who  seem  to  have  taken  Florida  under  their  espe- 
cial tutelage,  there  meet  and  mingle  freely  with  those  from  other  sections ;  even 
the  English  and  French  are  beginning  to  find  attractions  at  St.  Augustine,  and 
my  lord  doffs  his  shooting  suit  to  spend  a  few  days  in  the  pleasant  society  gath- 
ered in  the  shade  of  the  orange-trees  and  the  pines.  The  Florida  Press,  which 
Mr.  Charles  Whitney,  of  New  York,  has  established  at  St.  Augustine,  represents 
.Northern  sentiment,  and  in  its  pleasant  editorial  parlors  gentlemen  from  all  the 
Northern  and  Western  States  gather  every  morning  to  exchange  opinions. 
Meantime  the  ladies  are  shopping  in  the  tiny  box-like  shops  in  the  toy  streets. 
They  buy  rich  stores  of  brilliant  wings  of  flamingoes,  or  pink  curlews  (all  the 
hues  of  the  rainbow  are  found  on  the  feathers  of  the  Floridian  birds) ;  or  they  fill 
their  pockets  with  alligators'  teeth,  curiously  carved,  or  send  home  coquina  vases, 
or  box  a  young  alligator  a  foot  long,  in  Spanish  moss,  and  express  him  North  to 
a  timid  friend.  Or  they  visit  such  superb  orange  groves  as  that  of  Dr.  Ander- 
son, where  eight  hundred  noble  trees  hang  loaded  with  yellow  fruit ;  or  visit  the 
cemetery  where  repose  Dade  and  the  brave  soldiers  who  lost  their  lives  in  the 
Seminole  war,  under  the  tomahawks  of  Osceola  and  his  men;  or  peer  into  the  two 
convents ;  or  at  evening,  when  the  sky  near  the  horizon  is  filled  with  Daubigny- 
tints,  wander  on  the  beach,  the  warm,  moist  wind  blowing  across  their  faces,  and 
the  shells  and  brittle  sea- weeds  crackling  beneath  their  feet. 

The  war  did  not  greatly  impair  St.  Augustine.  A  few  fine  homes  were 
destroyed,  and  much  suffering  and  privation  were  caused  by  the  removal  to  the 
Nassau  river  of  such  families  as  refused  to  take  the  oath  of  loyalty.  The  Federal 
Government  obtained  possession  in  1862,  and  kept  it.  Of  course  many  fortunes 
were  completely  broken,  and  scores  of  people  in  the  town,  as  throughout  Florida, 
are  living  in  straitened  circumstances  doubly  painful  because  they  have  never 
before  known  self-dependence.  The  town  now  has  good  educational  facilities  for 
white  and  black,  although  before  the  war  it  had  none.  The  natives  of  St.  Augustine 
rejoice  as  much  as  do  the  Northerners  at  the  progress  of  the  free  and  public 
schools.  But  in  the  back-country,  so  far  as  1  could  learn,  there  are  neither 
school-houses,  schools,  nor  sentiment  in  favor  of  either. 


26 


XLIII. 

THE  CLIMATE  OF  FLORIDA  —  A  JOURNEY  TO  PALATKA. 

THE  climate  of  Florida  is  undoubtedly  its  chief  charm.  Its  beauties  and 
virtues  have  for  a  hundred  years  filled  the  homes  of  St.  Augustine  with 
people  striving  to  recover  from  the  effects  of  severer  surroundings ;  and  it  will 
always  be  a  refuge.  The  equable  temperature  is  one  of  the  great  excellences  of 
the  climate.  The  thermometer  rarely  falls  below  30  degrees,  or  rises  above  95 
degrees.  The  mean  temperature  of  the  winter  months  at  St.  Augustine,  for  100 
years,  according  to  the  old  Spanish  records,  averaged  a  little  over  60  degrees. 
The  climate  of  the  State  is  of  course  varied,  as  it  extends  through  six  degrees  of 
latitude.  The  greatest  heats  in  summer  are  never  equal  to  those  experienced  in 
New  York  and  Boston.  One  writer,  who  is  considered  good  authority,  says  that 
during  his  eighteen  years  of  residence  in  Florida,  the  greatest  heat  was  96  degrees 
in  the  shade.  The  climate  of  the  whole  State  from  October  to  June  has  been 
characterized  as  "  one  continuous  spring."  Periods  of  cold  or  frost  never  last  but 
a  few  hours,  and  rarely  come,  save  in  January,  once  or  twice.  The  nights, 
whatever  the  character  of  the  days  preceding  them,  are  always  cool.  Both  the 
winter  and  summer  weather  in  East  Florida  is  delightful.  The  winters  in  that 
section  are  so  mild  that  "the  most  delicate  vegetables  and  plants  of  the  Caribbean 
Islands,"  says  one  writer,  "  experience  there  not  the  least  injury  from  the 
season ;"  and  the  orange,  the  plantain,  the  banana,  the  guava,  and  the  pine- 
apple attain  a  luxuriant  growth.  The  medical  statistics  of  the  army  show  that 
the  climate  of  the  State  as  a  whole  ranks  preeminent  in  point  of  salubrity.  Solon 
Robinson,  formerly  the  agricultural  editor  of  the  Tribune,  who  now  resides  at 
Jacksonville,  tells  me  that  he  considers  the  climate  of  East  Florida  undoubtedly 
the  best  in  the  country.  A  general  impression  prevails  in  the  North  that  on 
account  of  the  large  bodies  of  swamp  land  in  the  State,  any  one  going  there  to 
reside,  even  temporarily,  will  incur  danger  of  malarial  disease.  It  is,  however, 
established  beyond  controversy  that  there  is  never  any  danger  from  malaria  in 
the  winter  months ;  and  that  it  is,  to  quote  Mr.  Robinson  once  more,  "  certainly 
no  worse  for  immigrants  from  any  of  the  Northern  States  than  central  New  York 
was  in  its  early  settlement  for  those  who  went  into  the  forests  from  New 
England."  Despite  the  fact  that  there  are  malarial  diseases  which  attack  the 
careless  and  unacclimated  who  remain  in  the  State  through  all  the  seasons,  it  is 
still  true  that  even  with  the  moribund  from  half-a-dozen  harsh  climates  sent  to 
her  to  care  for,  Florida  can  show  cleaner  bills  of  health  than  any  other  State  in 
the  Union. 

Frost  reaches  all  parts  of  the  State  on  rare  occasions,  but  has  seldom  been 
known  to  go  below  latitude  27  degrees.     It  has  sometimes  visited  Jacksonville 

% 


THE    CLIMATE     OF     FLORIDA.  399 

and  other  points  along  the  St.  John's  river  when  the  mercury  stood  at  40 
degrees.  In  Eastern  Florida  it  rarely  does  damage  to  the  sweet  oranges,  or  the 
banana.  In  West  Florida  there  is,  say  the  authorities,  "  a  constant  struggle 
between  the  north-west  wind  and  the  trade-wind,  and  fruit  growing  incurs 
dangers."  The  seasons  are  the  wet  and  the  dry;  the  rains,  which  come  with 
astonishing  regularity  at  certain  hours  during  the  summer  days,  fall  in  heavy 
showers,  and  leave  a  cloudless  sky  behind  them.  There  is  rarely  any  rain  during 
the  winter  months.  Surgeon- General  Lawson  in  one  of  his  reports  announces 
that  while  in  the  middle  division  of  the  United  States  the  proportion  is  one  death 
to  thirty-six  cases  of  remittent  fever ;  in  the  northern  division,  one  to  fifty- two ; 
in  the  southern  division,  one  to  fifty-four ;  in  Texas,  one  to  seventy-eight ;  and 
in  California,  one  to  one  hundred  and  forty- eight, — in  Florida  it  is  only  one  to 
two  hundred  and  eighty-seven. 

If  a  perfectly  equable  climate,  where  a  soothing  warmth  and  moisture  com- 
bined prevail,  be  desirable  for  consumptives,  it  can  be  found  nowhere  in  the 
Southern  States,  save  in  South-eastern  Florida.  The  number  of  persons 
whom  I  saw  during  my  journey,  who  had  migrated  to  the  eastern  or  southern 
sections  of  the  State  many  years  before, — "  more  than  half-dead  with  con- 
sumption," and  who  are  now  robust  and  vigorous, — was  sufficient  to  convince 
me  of  the  great  benefits  derived  from  a  residence  there.  Physicians  all  agree 
that  the  conditions  necessary  to  insure  life  to  the  consumptive  are  admirably  pro- 
vided in  the  climatic  resources  of  the  peninsula.  That  great  numbers  of  invalids 
find  the  localities  along  the  St.  John's  river,  and  even  on  the  coast,  distressing  to 
them,  is  said,  by  some  physicians,  to  be  due  to  the  fact  that  those  invalids  go 
there  after  disease  has  become  too  deeply-seated.  The  European  medical  men 
are  beginning  to  send  many  patients  to  Florida,  cautioning  them  where  to  go.  It 
would  seem  impossible  for  the  most  delicate  invalid  to  be  injured  by  a  residence 
anywhere  on  the  eastern  or  south-eastern  coast  from  St.  Augustine  down.  For 
those  who,  from  various  causes,  find  that  each  successive  Northern  winter, — with 
its  constantly  shifting  temperature  and  its  trying  winds,  which  even  the  healthy 
characterize  as  "deadly," — saps  their  vitality  more  and  more,  Florida  may  be 
safely  recommended  as  a  home,  winter  and  summer.  For  the  healthy,  and  those 
seeking  pleasure,  it  will  become  a  winter  paradise ;  for  the  ailing  it  is  a  refuge 
and  strength;  for  the  severely  invalided  its  results  depend  entirely  upon  choice 
of  location  and  the  progress  which  the  disease  has  already  made.  The  perfection 
of  the  Floridian  winter  climate  is  said  to  be  obtained  at  Miami,  near  Key  Bis- 
cayne  bay,  on  the  Miami  river.  There,  among  the  cocoanuts  and  the  mangroves, 
invalids  may  certainly  count  on  laying  a  new  hold  upon  life. 

Returning  from  St.  Augustine  to  the  St.  John's  river,  I  continued  my  journey 
southward  from  Tocoi,  the  terminus  of  the  horse-railroad  before  mentioned. 
Over  this  road,  by  the  way,  thousands  of  Northern  people  journey  yearly ;  and 
the  wharf,  during  the  winter  months,  is  crowded  at  the  arrival  and  departure  of 
the  boats  with  fashionably  dressed  tourists,  who  seem  strangely  out  of  place  in 
the  semi-tropical  forests.  The  "Florence,"  a  sprightly  steamer,  brought  me  to 
Palatka  early  in  the  afternoon,  affording  all  the  way  a  delightful  view  of  the  wide 


400 


PALATKA,      ON     THE     ST.    JOHN'S     RIVER. 


stream,  on  whose  sun-transfigured  breast  the  wild  ducks  were  flushing  their  eager 
wings;  and  over  which,  now  and  then,  flew  the  heron  and  the  water- goose 
uttering  strange  cries.  Dr.  Westcott,  at  Tocoi  (a  gentleman  who  spent  thirty- 
three  years  of  his  life  in  the  Floridian  forests,  and  who  has  once  been  Surveyor- 
General  of  the  State),  told  me  that  the  Spaniards  called  the  river  at  that  point 
Lake  Valdes.  One  finds  it  wide  and  narrow  alternately  until  Palatka  is  reached. 
There  the  stream  has  formed  a  broad  lake,  from  which  there  seems  no  outlet 
whatever.  Palatka  is  a  very  pretty  town  of  fifteen  hundred  inhabitants,  on  the 
west  bank.  It  is  at  the  head  of  navigation  for  ocean  steamers,  and  is  character- 
ized by  a  richness  of  vegetation,  and  a  mildness  of  climate  which  is  not  found  at 
Jacksonville.  It  has  become  a  favorite  resort  for  the  Northerners,  and  I  found 
the  Vermonters  there  in  force.      Colonel  Hart,  who  went  to  Florida  to  die,  some 

years  ago,  now  owns  fine  prop- 


erties near  and  in  Palatka, 
and  has  drawn  around  him  the 
sterling  New  England  thrift 
and  management,  of  which  he 
is  such  an  admirable  example. 
Steamers  arrive  daily  from 
North  and  South,  and  the 
facilities  for  travel  are  quite  as 
numerous  and  as  good  as  upon 
the  Hudson.  The  consump- 
tives from  the  North  return 
yearly  to  this  vivifying  and 
delicious  climate,  in  which  they 
find  an  arrest  of  Death's  de- 
cree against  them. 

At  Palatka  we  first  found 
the  banana  and  the  orange  in 
their  richest  profusion,  and 
noted  what  culture  would  do 
for  them  both.  The  town  is 
backed  by  an  interminable 
pine  forest,  through  which  run  but  few  roads;  but  the  ample  space  along  the 
river  front  abounds  in  grand  groves  of  oak,  draped  with  the  cool  mosses,  hung  in 
most  ravishingly  artistic  forms ;  and  the  wild  orange  grows  in  the  streets.  This 
town  has  a  cheery,  neat,  New  England  look ;  the  white  painted  houses,  with 
their  porches  nestling  in  vines  and  shrubbery,  invite  to  repose.  The  two 
old-fashioned,  roomy  hotels  (to  one  of  which  an  immense  wooden  addition 
has  been  made)   are  cool  and  comfortable. 

The  mornings  in  December,  January,  February  and  March,  the  four  abso- 
lutely perfect  months  of  Eastern  Florida,  are  wonderfully  soft  and  balmy ;  the 
sun  shines  generously,  but  there  is  no  suspicion  of  annoying  heat.  The  breeze 
gently  rustles  the  enormous  leaves  of  the  banana,  or  playfully  tumbles  a  golden 


i 

The  Banana — "At  Palatka  we  first  found  the  banana  in  profusion." 


PALATKA  BEFORE  AND  AFTER  THE  WAR.  4OI 

orange  to  the  ground,  that  a  plump  goose  or  duckling  may  at  once  thrust  its  bill 
into  the  .tender  fruit.  The  giant  cactus  in  a  neighboring  garden  peers  out  from 
among  the  fruit-trees  like  some  scaly  monster.  The  cart  of  the  "cracker"  (the 
native  farmer's  appellation),  laden  with  game  and  vegetables,  plies  from  door  to 
door,  and  wild  turkeys  and  dappled  deer  are  purchased  for  dinner.  Little  parties 
lazily  bestow  themselves  along  the  river  bank,  with  books  or  sketching  materials, 
and  alternately  work,  doze,  or  gossip,  until  the  whistles  of  the  ascending  or 
descending  steamers  are  heard,  when  everybody  flocks  to  the  wharves.  At 
evening  a  splendid  white  moonlight  transfigures  all  the  leaves  and  trees  and 
flowers ;  the  banjo  and  guitar,  accompanying'  negro  melodies,  are  heard  in  the 
streets ;  a  heavy  tropical  repose  falls  over  the  little  town,  its  wharves  and  rivers. 

This  was  not  always  so.  After  the  war  was  over,  a  few  adventurous  Yankees 
betook  themselves  to  Palatka,  but  were  not  heartily  received  by  the  rude  back- 
woodsmen and  dubious  "  cracker"  element  which  still  lingered  about  there.  In 
war  time,  15,000  Union  troops  had  been  quartered  at  Palatka,  and  previous  to 
that  the  town  had  on  one  occasion  been  bombarded.  The  Floridians  had  suffered 
a  good  deal,  and  there  was  severe  enmity  toward  the  "Yankees."  The  first 
attempt  to  open  a  hotel  by  a  Northern  man  was  severely  resented.  Parties  of 
rough  horsemen  used  to  ride  in  and  attempt  to  provoke  a  fight  by  sticking  their 
bowie-knives  in  the  hotel  door.  Shooting  affrays  were  common.  I  was  shown  a 
spot  where  the  sheriff  himself  tore  up  the  turf  during  a  fight  of  an  hour  or  two 
with  his  own  brothers-in-law,  who  were  determined  to  kill  him  because  he  sup- 
ported the  "  Yankees,"  then  gradually  creeping  in.  Now  and  then  a  negro 
was  massacred. 

The  river's  banks  were  sometimes  the  scene  of  terribly  bloody  affrays.  Of 
course  it  was  only  the  rougher  classes  who  had  a  hand  in  this — people  who  rather 
objected  to  the  march  of  civilization.  It  made  them  uncomfortable.  Now  the 
town  is  as  peaceable  as  the  mountain  resorts  in  New  Hampshire  and  Vermont. 
Property  is  good  there,  and  has  taken  on  prices  which  show  a  real  demand  for  it. 
Three  thousand  dollars  are  asked  for  a  little  house  and  lot  which  would  hardly 
bring  any  more  in  the  North.  But  all  the  region  adjacent  to  Palatka,  and 
especially  on  the  opposite  side  of  the  river,  is  getting  settled  up  and  cultivated. 


XLIV. 

ORANGE  CULTURE  IN  FLORIDA — FERTILITY  OF  THE 

PENINSULA. 

JUST  across  the  river  from  Palatka  lies  the  beautiful  orange  grove  owned  by 
Colonel  Hart,  in  which  seven  hundred  trees,  some  forty  years  old,  annually 
bear  an  enormous  crop  of  the  golden  fruit,  and  yield  their  owner  an  income  of 
$i2,ooo  or  $15,000.  The  trees  bear  from  twelve  to  twenty-five  hundred  oranges 
eacn ;  some  have  been  known  to   bear   four  or   five  thousand.     The    orchard 


"Just  across  the  river  from  Palatka  lies  the  beautiful  orange  grove  owned  by  Colonel  Hart." 

requires  the  care  of  only  three  men,  an  overseer  and  two  negroes.  The 
myriads  of  fish  to  be  caught  at  any  time  in  the  river  furnish  material  for  compost 
heaps,  with  which  the  land  is  annually  enriched.  At  the  gateway  of  this  superb 
orchard  stand  several  grand  bananas;  entering  the  cool  shade —  some  resplendent 
December  day — one  finds  the  negroes  gathering  the  fruit  into  bags  strapped  at 
their  sides,  and  bearing  it  away  to  storehouses  where  it  is  carefully  packed  for 
the  steamers  which  are  to  bear  it  North.  On  the  sand  from  which  the  hardy 
trunks  of  the  orange  spring  there  is  a  splendid  checker-work  of  light  and  shade, 
and  one  catches  through  the  interstices  occasional  glimpses  of  the  broad  river 


ORANGE      CULTURE      IN      FLORIDA.  4O3 

current.  In  an  adjacent  nursery,  a  hundred  thousand  young  orange-trees  await 
transplanting  and  "budding." 

This  culture  of  oranges  will  certainly  become  one  of  the  prime  industries  of 
Florida.  The  natives  of  the  poorer  class,  who  might  make  fortunes  by  turning 
their  attention  to  it,  are  too  idle  to  develop  the  country.  They  prefer  to  hunt 
and  fish,  and,  as  a  rule,  cannot  be  prevailed  upon  to  undertake  serious  work. 
The  mass  of  Northern  men  who  undertook  orange- raising  directly  after  the  war, 
failed  because  they  did  not  employ  skilled  labor.  The  eastern  bank  of  the  river 
is  considered  safer  than  the  western  for  the  culture,  as  frosts  rarely  reach  the 
former.  But  for  many  miles  up  and  down  the  stream,  the  culture  has  proved 
reasonably  successful  on  both  sides.  The  property  is  becoming  exceedingly 
good,  yearly  rising  in  value.  Colonel  Hart  thinks  his  grove  is  worth  at  least 
$75,000.  In  a  few  years  such  establishments  as  those  of  Mr.  Stockwell  of  Maine, 
with  four  hundred  bearing-trees ;  Mr.  Burr  of  Morristown,  N.  J.;  the  estate' of 
Masters  (two  hundred  trees);  Mr.  Brown,  a  New  Yorker  (two  thousand  young 
trees);  Dr.  Parsons,  the  Long  Island  nurseryman,  and  others  adjacent  to 
Colonel  Hart's  property,  will  yield  fortunes  to  their  owners.  Connected  with 
most  of  the  orchards  are  many  fine  lemon  and  lime-trees.  Colonel  Dancey,  six 
miles  below  Palatka,  has  a  lemon  grove  of  two  hundred  trees.  Among  the  other 
noticeable  groves  below  Palatka,  are  those  of  Dr.  Cowgill,  the  State  Comptroller; 
Colonel  Cole  of  Orange  Mills,  who  has  some  two  thousand  trees  well  started; 
Doctor  Mays,  at  Orange  Mills ;  a  number  of  New  York  gentlemen  at  Federal 
Point;  that  of  Captain  J.  W.  Stark,  nearly  opposite  Orange  Mills,  and  the  fine 
estate  of  Captain  Rossignol. 

Above  Palatka,  on  the  eastern  banks,  where  the  bluffs  are  quite  high  for 
Florida,  and  where  the  magnolia  and  water  oak  alternate  charmingly  with  the 
cypress,  the  swamp-ash  and  the  palm,  there  are  also  many  successful  orange 
groves  scattered  along  from  Rawlestown  (where  a  hundred  years  ago  an  unsuc- 
cessful attempt  was  made  to  found  an  industrial  retreat  for  the  unfortunate 
women  of  London)  to  San  Matteo,  Murphy's  Island,  Buffalo  Bluff,  Welaka,  and 
Beecher.  There  are  many  young  groves  on  the  Oclawaha  river,  and  more  than 
a  million  trees  are  already  budded  there.  Before  the  war,  acres  of  land  covered 
with  the  wild  orange  were  ruthlessly  cleared  to  make  room  for  cotton  and  cane. 
It  is  mainly  Northern  capital  that  re  invested  in  orange  culture  throughout  the 
State  at  present.  In  the  Indian  river  region,  the  woods  along  the  banks  are, 
according  to  one  account,  "great  gardens  of  the  sour,  wild  orange,  and  we  often," 
says  the  traveler,  "  had  to  clear  the  ground  of  vast  quantities  of  the  fruit  before 
we  could  pitch  our  tents."  These  wild  trees  can  be  set  out  in  new  lands,  and  at 
a  proper  time  budded  with  the  sweet  orange.  Any  time  during  the  winter 
months  is  proper  for  transplanting.  The  "buds,"  or  grafts,  grow  enormously  the 
first  year ;  and,  in  five  years  at  most,  if  one  hundred  transplanted  trees  have  been 
set  out  on  an  acre,  that  acre  will  yield  10,000  oranges;  next  year  the  yield  will 
be  doubled,  and  in  ten  years  from  the  date  of  transplanting,  with  anything  like 
reasonable  success,  one  is  sure  of  an  income  for  life.  For  the  orange  is  a  hardy 
tree,  gives  a  sure  crop,  has  few  insect  enemies,  and  lives  for  more  than  a  hundred 


404 


THE      INDIAN      RIVER  —  FRUIT     CULTURE     IN     GENERAL. 


years.  A  good  tree  will  bear  from  one  thousand  to  three  thousand  oranges  yearly. 
Some  of  the  trees  in  an  orchard  at  Mandarin  have  produced  as  many  as  5,500, 
many  of  the  oranges  weighing  nearly  a  pound  each.     One  single  grove  on  the 

Indian  river,  with  1,350  trees,  pro- 
duced in  a  season  700,000  oranges. 
Only  a  small  capital  is  needed  for 
the  starting  of  a  grove,  and  the  re- 
wards of  a  successful  one  are  very 
great.  Oranges  sell  at  from  $25  to 
$68  per  thousand  in  Jacksonville,  and 
are  readily  salable  in  any  of  the 
Atlantic  seaports.  When  the  neces- 
sary dredging  and  building  of  canals 
has  been  .accomplished,  so  that  the 
Indian  river  may  have  an  outlet  via 
St.  John,  the  North  will  be  supplied 
with  oranges  of  more  delicate  texture 
than  any  it  has  yet  seen ;  and  the 
number  of  groves  along  the  river  will 
be  legion. 

The  fitness  of  Florida  for  the 
growth  of  tropical  and  semi-tropical 
fruits  is  astonishing.  Not  only  do  the 
orange,  the  lemon,  the  lime,  and  the  citron  flourish  there,  but  the  peach,  the 
grape,  the  fig,  the  pomegranate,  the  plum,  all  varieties  of  berries,  the  olive,  the 
banana,  and  the  pine -apple  grow  luxuriantly.  Black  Hamburg  and  white 
Muscat  grapes  fruit  finely  in  the  open  air;  the  Concord  and  the  Scuppernong 
are  grown  in  vast  quantities.  The  guava,  the  tamarind,  the  wonderful  alliga- 
tor-pear, the  plantain,  the  cocoanut,  and  the  date,  the  almond  and  the  pecan 
luxuriate  in  Southern  Florida.  We  have  within  our  boundaries  a  tropic  land, 
rich  and  strange,  which  will  one  day  be  inhabited  by  thousands  of  fruit-growers, 
and  where  beautiful  towns,  and  perhaps  cities,  will  yet  spring  up. 

Nothing  can  be  more  beautiful  than  one  of  the  Floridian  cottages,  surrounded 
with  a  flourishing  grove  of  orange-trees,  rhat  of  Dr.  Moragne,  at  Palatka,  is 
one  of  the  best  examples.  Down  at  the  river  front  the  good  doctor  has  a  long 
row  of  flourishing  bananas,  beyond  which  the  great  river  is  spread  out — a  gentle 
lake — before  him.  From  his  porch  he  looks  upon  several  acres  of  noble  trees, 
with  thousands  of  oranges  nestling  among  the  dark  green  leaves.  They  come 
without  care ;  one  man  picks  them  and  prepares  them  for  market,  and  they  leave 
a  golden,  or,  at  least,  a  paper  harvest  annually  behind  them.  Some  of  the  200 
trees  within  the  doctor's  inclosure  yearly  produce  3,000  to  4,000  oranges,  and 
will  go  on  their  round  of  blossom  and  fruit  for  half  a  century.* 

*  The  Union  officer  in  command  at  Palatka  during  the  war  was  ordered  to  destroy  all  the 
trees  around  the  town  for  military  purposes.  He  could  not  find  it  in  his  heart  to  ruin  Dr. 
Moragne's  beautiful  grove  ;  so  he  picketed  his  cavalry  there,  and  evaded  the  order. 


jfrr.    '  it    ,-)    rv-\ 

Entrance  to  Colonel  Hart's  Orange  Grove,  opposite  Palatka. 


THE      FERTILITY     OF      FLORIDA      LANDS.  4O5 

Palatka  was  an  Indian  trading  post  in  1835.  The  Government  built  a  road 
thence  to  Tampa,  and  kept  a  guard  upon  it,  in  the  days  when  the  Seminoles  were 
still  vigorous  in  their  warfare.  There  are  now  but  few  Indians  left  in  the  State, 
and  they,  though  peacefully  inclined,  remain  buried  in  the  Everglades,  or  among 
the  forests  of  Indian  river.  Great  numbers  of  them  were  ignominiously  hunted 
down  at  various  periods  after  the  wars,  and  rewards  were  set  upon  their  heads  as 
if  they  had  been  criminals.  Soldiers  wers  employed,  or  induced,  by  the  hope  of 
money,  to  follow  them  into  their  remotest  fastnesses,  and  to  disperse  them.  Now 
an  occasional  warrior,  scantily  clad,  and  dejected  in  appearance,  is  at  rare  inter- 
vals seen  in  some  of  the  towns. 

At  Palatka  one  may  gain  a  good  idea  of  what  culture  and  the  advent  of 
ambitious  Northerners  can  do  for  Florida.  There  are  so  many  superior  induce- 
ments offered  by  the  peninsula  to  those  in  search  of  new  abiding-places,  that  I 
must  content  myself  with  a  brief  summing  up  of  each.  I  suppose  that  the  average 
observer,  unfamiliar  with  the  character  of  a  sub-tropical  country,  would  traverse 
the  peninsula  constantly  remarking  that  he  had  never  before  seen  so  much  good-for- 
nothing  land.  The  eternal  pine  woods  in  many  sections  would  prepossess  him 
unfavorably,*  he  would  not  even  appreciate  the  exceeding  richness  of  the 
hummocks  until  he  had  been  instructed  in  their  qualities.  The  lands  of  the 
State  are  usually  classified  into  hummocks,  pine,  and  swamp.  Through  the 
first-rate  pine  lands,  where  forests  of  pitch  and  yellow  pine  grow  rankly,  runs 
a  dark  vegetable  mould,  under  which  lies  a  chocolate-colored  sandy  loam,  mixed 
with  limestone  pebbles,  and  resting  on  a  substratum  of  marl.  Lands  of  this 
class  are  so  fertile  that  they  have  yielded  400  pounds  of  long  staple  cotton  to 
the  acre  for  fourteen  successive  years  without  any  fertilizing.  The  second-rate 
pine  lands  offer-  excellent  pasturage,  and,  when  re-enforced,  will  yield  3,000 
pounds  of  sugar  to  the  acre.  Upon  them  also  can  be  grown  oranges,  lemons, 
and  Cuba  tobacco.  Even  the  poorest  pine  lands  have  been  found  admirably 
adapted  to  the  growth  of  hemp,  and  also  give  a  good  income  from  the  naval 
stores  which  the  trees  yield. 

Throughout  these  pine  lands,  at  intervals  of  a  few  miles,  there  are  hummocks 
of  every  size,  varying  from  an  acre  or  two  to  tracts  of  20,000  or  30,000.  These  are 
wonderfully  rich,  and  persons  wishing  to  cultivate  them  can  choose  their  resi- 
dences on  the  higher  pine  lands,  where  there  will  be  no  danger  of  malarial  fevers, 
and  only  spend  their  days  among  the  hummocks.  The  low  hummocks  are 
very  fertile,  and  before  the  war  were  the  seats  of  many  fine  sugar  plantations. 
The  high  hummocks  are  considered  among  the  best  lands  in  Florida;  their 
fertility  is  really  extraordinary,  and  the  only  preparation  which  they  need  for  the 
production  of  luxuriant  crops  is  clearing  and  ploughing,  while,  in  addition,  the 
low  hummocks  require  draining. 

The  swamp  lands  of  the  peninsula  are  still,  as  it  were,  in  process  of  formation, 
and  are  thought  to  be  of  even  more  durable  fertility  than  the  hummocks.  They 
are  of  alluvial  formation,  occupying  basins  into  which  immense  deposits  of  decay- 
ing vegetable  matter  have  been  washed  from  higher  lands.  Some  astonishing 
results  in  sugar-planting  have  been  obtained  in  those  swamps.     Four  hogsheads 


406  FLORIDA     AS     A      PRODUCER. 

to  the  acre  were  produced  near  New  Smyrna,  in  East  Florida,  a  production 
which  completely  overtops  that  of  Louisiana.  While  Texas  and  Louisiana  cane- 
planters  are  obliged  to  cut  their  cane  in  October,  because  of  early  frost,  in  Florida 
it  may  stand  unharmed  until  late  in  December.  Vast  bodies  of  these  swamp 
lands  are  now  lying  untilled  in  Florida,  and  may  be  had  at  two  dollars  per  acre. 
In  Leroy  county  alone  there  are  said  to  be  100,000  acres  of  the  best  kind  of 
sugar-land.* 

While  the  tracts  along  the  St.  John's  river  are  not  considered  extraordinary 
in  point  of  fertility,  still,  within  a  mile  of  the  banks,  there  are  thousands  of  acres 
of  fine  hummock  land  which  might  be  tilled  with  great  profit.  The  counties  of 
Middle  Florida  offer  abundant  high  hummock  lands  ;  so  do  many  counties  in  the 
eastern  section.  As  soon  as  production  begins  in  earnest  the  producer  will 
learn  to  appreciate  the  advantageous  situation  of  Florida.  Lying  directly  across 
one  of  the  great  highways  of  traffic,  and  within  a  'day  and  a-half  of  New  Orleans, 
three  days  of  New  York,  and  one  of  Cuba,  by  steamer ;  with  such  harbors  as 
Tampa,  Fernandina,  Pensacola,  Cedar  Keys  and  Charlotte,  and  with  reasonably 
good  means  of  internal  communication  by  road,  and  superb  ones  by  river,  the 
State  has  no  reason  to  complain.  Cotton  was,  of  course,  the  principal  staple 
before  the  war ;  but  a  great  variety  of  production  will  henceforth  be  the  rule. 
Indian  corn  will  grow  throughout  the  State,  and  has  been  liberally  raised, 
although  not  yet  in  sufficient  quantities  to  supply  the  home  demand.  Fruit  and 
vegetable  culture  along  the  lines  of  the  rivers,  with  reference  to  the  Northern 
markets,  is  becoming  one  of  the  principal  industries.  The  culture  of  cotton  at 
present  does  not  pay  in  the  State;  and  the  production,  which  in  i860  amounted 
to  63,000  bales  of  ginned  cotton,  is  gradually  decreasing.  Sugar-cane  is  one  of 
the  great  hopes  of  the  commonwealth.  It  is  confidently  asserted  that  the  yield 
of  this  staple  in  Florida  is  twice  that  of  Louisiana.  Solon  Robinson  says  that 
*-  small  farmers  can  grow  cane  upon  any  good  pine  land,  and  can  make  sugar  as 
easily  as  Yankee  farmers  make  cider."  He  evidently  does  not  believe  that  the 
successful  culture  of  the  cane  is  inseparable  from  the  old  plantation  system. 
Rice,  indigo,  silk,  coffee,  tea,  and  the  ramie  plant  are  likely  to  be  among  the 
other  agricultural  interests  of  Florida.  The  palmetto,  scattered  so  luxuriantly 
through  Florida,  is  now  extensively  used  in  the  manufacture  of  paper,  and  forms 
the  basis  of  a  great  industry.  On  the  entire  coast  are  excellent  locations  for  salt 
works,  and  at  the  commencement  of  the  war,  large  works  had  been  established 
on  Key  West  Island  for  the  manufacture  of  salt  by  solar  evaporation.  Along 
the  coast,  too,  there  is  such  a  multitude  of  oysters,  fish,  and  game,  that  enter- 
prises for  supplying  the  market  from  that  section  should  be  very  successful.  The 
turtle  and  the  fish  are  celebrated  everywhere ;  and  the  Indian  river  oyster 
deserves  a  ballad  to  his  charms  by  some  noted  gastronomer. 

The  natural  resources  for  fertilizers  are  abundant  in  the  State.  From  the 
swamp  lands  may  always  be  had  a  muck  which  serves  admirably,  and  the  clay 
itself,  which  lies  next  to  the  sandy  soil  in  a  large  part  of  the  State,  is  a  fine 
fertilizer  when  mixed  directly.     There  are  also  immense  accumulations  of  shells, 

*  See  Adams  on  Florida. 


EXPENSE      OF      BUILDING RENTS. 


407 


of  the  periwinkle  and  conch,  which  are  well  calculated  to  strengthen  land,  and 
deposits  of  green  marl  are  easily  accessible. 

The  expense  of  building  is  very  slight  in  Florida,  for  the  houses  need  none  of 
the  plastering  and  weather- tightening  so  necessary  in  Northern  climates.  Simple 
houses,  cellarless,  and  raised  some  two  feet  from  the  ground  on  posts,  with  large, 
airy  rooms,  battened  instead  of  plastered,  and  surrounded  by  verandas,  are  best 
adapted  to  the  climate.  In  the  towns,  as  a  rule,  rents  are  rather  high,  owing  to 
the  lack  of  building  during  the  past  perturbed  years. 


The  Guardian  Angel. 


I 


XLV. 

UP     THE     OCLAWAHA     TO      SILVER     SPRING. 

THE  Oclawaha  is  a  small  stream  running  through  swamps  and  still  lakes 
in  Putnam  and  Marion  counties.  It  empties  into  the  St.  John's  about 
twenty-five  miles  south  of  Palatka,  and  opposite  the  settlement  called  We-la-ka. 
The  river  took  its  name  from  that  of  one  of  the  seven  clans  of  Seminoles  who 
once  wandered  through  the  swamps  which  border  it,  and  hunted  in  the 
beautiful  lakes  above  it.  It  is  but  a  few  years  since  the  stream  was  rendered 
navigable,  and  to-day  its  mouth  is  so  embowered  in  foliage — such  great  curtains 
of  vines  and  water  plants  overhanging  it — that  the  passer-by  on  the  St. John's 
would  hardly  notice  it.  Boats  leave  Jacksonville  a#d  Palatka  every  Thursday 
for  Lake  Griffin,  and,  traversing  the  whole  forest  range  through  which  the 
Oclawaha  runs,  furnish  the  traveler  with  an  admirable  opportunity  to  see  some 
of  the  most  remarkable  lowland  scenery  in  the  world. 

The  invalid  from  the  North,  anxious  to  escape  not  only  from  the  trying 
climate  which  has  increased  his  malady,  but  also  the  memories  of  the  busy 
world  to  which  he  has  been  accustomed,  could  not  do  better  than  to  drift  up  and 
down  this  remote  and  secluded  stream,  whose  sylvan  peace  and  perfect  beauty 
will  bring  him  the  needed  repose.  Some  years  since,  an  ehterp rising  Yankee, 
familiar  with  the  charms  of  the  little  river,  conceived  the  project  of  a  floating 
hotel  to  constantly  make  trips  between  Palatka,  on  the  St.  John's,  and  the 
Silver  Spring,  one  of  the  most  beautiful  resorts  on  the  Oclawaha,  but  until  this 
mammoth  project  is  put  into  execution  the  traveler  must  content  himself  with 
the  wheezy  little  steamboats  which  lazily  mount  the  current,  or  must  come  in 
his  own  yacht. 

Yachting  on  the  Oclawaha  and  St.  John's  rivers  would  certainly  be  prime 
amusement  in  the  winter  season.  There  are  some  curious  characters  along  the 
little  stream, — hunters  and  trappers,  who  have  spent  many  years  in  the  woods  and 
swamps,  and  who  could  teach  the  amateur  sportsman  how  to  hunt  the  alligator 
in  his  lair,  to  snare  the  turtle,  and  now  and  then  to  shoot  a  noble  wild  turkey. 
If  neither  the  floating  hotel  nor  the  new  line  of  steamers  is  placed  on  this 
charming  water-way,  it  is  to  be  hoped  that  large  caravansaries  for  fashion- 
able visitors  may  be  erected  at  such  lovely  resorts  as  Silver  Spring  and  Ocala. 
The  hotel  accommodations  in  the  interior  of  Florida  are  generally  far  from 
excellent,  but  the  tide  of  travel  which  is  beginning  to  penetrate  even  to 
the  remotest  corners  of  the  peninsula  will  soon  cause  the  establishment  of 
hotels  which  will  be  thoroughly  satisfactory  to  Northern  and  foreign  visitors. 
The   whole    Oclawaha    region    had    not  been    properly   explored   until    toward 


THE      STEAMER 


•MARION. 


409 


1867,  although  many  travelers  who  had  penetrated  as  far  as  the  then  supposed 
head  of  navigation,  had  told  strange  and  seemingly  exaggerated  stories  of  its 
wonderful  beauty.  The  tales  of  floating  islands,  of  the  grandeur  and  almost 
frightful    calm  of  the  mighty   swamps — of  the  curious    colonies  of  birds    and 


A  Peep  into  a  Forest  on  the  Oclawaha. 

animals — the  superb  lakes,  and  the  lucent  waters,had  thrilled  many  a  brain;  but 
only  a  few  had  penetrated  these  watery,  sylvan  retreats  until  the  prying  Northern 
element  demanded  to  be  shown  all.  ,Now  a  journey  up  the  Oclawaha  is  as 
fashionable  as  a  promenade  on  the  Rhine,  and  really  more  interesting  and 
amusing. 

Our  party  embarked  at  Palatka  on  the  little  steamer  "  Marion,"  one  cool 
evening,  just  after  the  arrival  of  the  boat  from  Charleston;  and  while  the  officers 
of  her  huge  sister  were  still  shouting  themselves  hoarse  with  commands  to  the 
slouching  negroes  about  them,  our  tiny  bark  slipped  out  into  the  broad  current, 
and  set  slowly  off  midstream  at  the  rate  of  four  miles  an  hour,  for  a  journey  to 
Silver  Spring.  Although  cool,  it  was  not  uncomfortable,  and  one  was  from  time 
to  time  startled,  as  on  the  Mediterranean,  by  a  warm  breath  across  his  face,  per- 
fumed with  the  scent  of  oranges  and  the  rich  forest  growth.  The  lights  of 
cottages  along  the  banks  blinked  cheerily;  occasionally  a  descending  steamer 
yelled  her  warning,  and  we  blundered  leisurely  forward,  still  in  the  great  stream 
when  midnight  came,  and  sleepily  sought  the  tiny  cabins  allotted  us. 

It  must  have  been  two  o'clock  in  the  morning  when  I  was  awakened  by  a 
violent  brushing  and  scraping  noise,  as  if  the  boat  were  held  fast  amid  the  boughs 


4io 


TORCHLIGHT      IN     A      FLORIDA      FOREST. 


of  trees.  Lazily  gazing  out  of  the  cabin  I  saw,  with  surprise,  the  bough  of  a 
stout  shrub  entering  the  window,  then  vanishing  with  a  shriek  and  a  whisk,  as  if 
it  had  merely  looked  in  to  frighten  me. 

The  whole  thicket  was  lighted  up  as  by  some  supernatural  agency.  I  saw 
giant  cypresses,  their  dirty  white  trunks  seeming  about  to  topple  down  upon, 
me ;  saw  acres  of  glimmering  water,  in  which  the  mysterious  light  cast  a  thou- 
sand fantastic  gleams,  which  shifted  uneasily  every  moment;  saw  the  cypress- 
knees  dotting  the  thicket  in  every  direction;  saw  lovely  green  vines,  liter- 
ally spangled  with  white  and  blue  flowers,  and  arrayed  in  such  dense  and 
symmetrical  masses  that  I  could  not  persuade  myself  they  grew  wild  in  the 
thicket;  saw  a  heron  sitting,  low-perched,  on  a  shrub;  and  saw  the  flash  of 
wings,  as  from  time  to  time  our  advancing  boat's  monotonous  refrain  of  sighs 
from  its  two  steam-pipes  startled  the  birds  reposing  in  the  tree-tops. 

The  red-bay,  the  holly,  the  ash,  the  maple,  the  cypress,  toujour s  the  cypress, 
floated  before  my  half-closed  eyes;  then  vines  again,  then  more  birds, — won- 
dered if  I  should  see  an  alligator — what  they  would  have  for  breakfast — another 
tree  coming  in  at  my  window — "Look  out  thar,  Bill,  for  them  torches!"  and  at 
that  point,  I  think,  I  fell  asleep  again. 

In  the  morning  it  was  all  explained.  I  had  awakened  just  after  we  had 
entered  the  Oclawaha,  and  had  seen  the  glare  of  the  torches  by  which  we  groped 
our  way  in  the  narrow  channel  filled  with  spring- water.     Had  we  entered  in  the 


"We  would  brush  past  the  trees  and  vines."     [Page  411.] 


day-time,  I  should  have  seen  immense  floating  islets  of  lilies  and  barnets,  gently 
swayed  by  the  tremulous  currents,  and  hundreds  of- light-footed  birds  poising 
airily  upon  them ;  the  haughty  kingfisher  diving  for  his  prey ;  the  wild  turkey 


SCENES     ALONG     THE     OCLAWAHA.  411 

uttering  his  startled  cry ;  the  crane  making  himself  as  invisible  as  possible,  by- 
shrinking  until  he  seemed  merely  a  feather- ball;  and  the  rose-colored  curlew  rising 
into  the  air  like  a  flash  of  light  from  a  ruby.  Then,  too,  I  should  have  noted  the 
rafts  of  cypress-trees,  girded  together  with  bark  and  palmetto  strings,  and  as  we 
approached  the  shores,  might  have  caught  sight  of  the  wrinkle-throated  alligator 
wagging  his  huge  tail  cheerily  in  the  sunshine. 

All  day  we  wound  in  and  out  of  the  recesses  of  this  delicious  forest.  The 
banks  of  the  stream  were  scarcely  thirty  feet  apart,  as  a  rule,  although  sometimes 
the  current  broadened  to  twice  that  width.  We  were  perpetually  coming  to  a 
point  in  the  forest  from  which  there  seemed  no  possible  egress,  when,  rounding  a 
sharp  corner,  the  negro  boatmen  pushing  with  their  long  poles,  we  would  brush 
past  the  trees  and  vines,  and  once  more  plod  on  by  cypress,  water  oak,  ash,  and 
orange-tree. 

The  richly  variegated  colors  of  the  far-extending  thickets  were  mirrored 
so  completely  in  the  water,  that  we  seemed  suspended  or  floating  over  an 
enchanted  forest.  The  clumps  of  saplings  garnished  with  vines ;  the  stately 
bosquets  of  palms,  now  growing  a  score  together  on  a  little  hillock,  and  now 
standing  apart,  like  sentinels ;  the  occasional  magnolias ;  the  long  swamp-ways 
out  of  which  barges,  rowed  by  negroes,  would  come  to  receive  the  mail,  and 
into  which  they  vanished  again,  the  oarsmen  hardly  exchanging  a  word  with  our 
captain ;  the  fierce-faced,  bearded  men,  armed  with  rifles  and  revolvers,  who 
sometimes  hailed  us  from  a  point  of  land,  to  know  if  we  "  wanted  any  meat," 
and  showed  us  deer  and  turkeys,  and  perhaps  the  skin  of  a  gray  wolf  or  a  black 
bear, — all  these  novelties  of  the  tropics  and  the  backwoods  kept  us  in  perplexed 
wonder.  When  evening  came  slowly  on  again,  a  round  moon  silvered  the  water, 
and  enabled  us  to  see  even  the  ducks  that  floated  half  submerged,  and  curiously 
eyed  our  little  boat.  By  day,  one  sees  hundreds  of  turtles,  as  on  the  St.  John's, 
sunning  themselves.  The  birds  are  legion.  They  chatter  in  the  tree-tops ; 
they  offer  themselves  freely  as  marks  for  revolver-bullets ;  they  scold  at  night  as 
the  torchlight  awakes  them  ;  and  they  accompany  the  echo  of  each  unsuccessful 
shot  with  loud  derisive  singing. 

The  torches  of  pine-knots  placed  securely  on  the  boat's  roof,  and  watched 
there  by  a  habile  negro  boy,  aid  the  reflection  in  the  water  to  a  new  beauty. 
The  cypresses  seem  more  ghostly;  the  vines  more  luxuriant;  the  long-necked 
white  birds  more  comical ;  the  palms  more  majestic  than  by  day.  Now  and  then 
a  beacon  disclosed  some  lonely  cabin,  thatched  with  palmetto,  beside  which  stood 
a  solitary  figure  with  gun  strapped  over  his  back.  "  Got  any  terbacker,  Cap'n?" 
or  some  such  question,  and  we  left  the  figure  behind.  Penetrating  Eureka 
creek,  we  wormed  our  way  through  a  little  streamlet  only  twenty  feet  wide.  At 
Fort  Brooke,  large  quantities  of  the  rich  crops  of  Alachua  county  were  formerly 
shipped,  but  the  railroad  now  transports  them. 

A  little  above  Fort  Brooke  one  comes  to  Orange  creek,  the  outlet  of  a  charm- 
ing lake,  in  Masson  and  Alachua  counties,  with  lovely  orange  groves  upon  its 
banks  and  sulphur  springs  near  by.  In  conversation  with  people  who  came  and 
went  at  the  wayside  stations  in  the  swamps,  I  found  that  they  had  all  been  well- 


412 


SILVER     SPRING,      THE      "FOUNTAIN     OF     YOUTH." 


to-do  "before"  the  war,  and  that  they  were  healthy  and  happy  in  their  tropic 
wilderness  home.  The  needs  of  Florida  in  the  lines  of  canals  and  convenient 
short-cuts  were  well  exemplified  in  the  case  of  a  planter  from  the  St.  John's  river, 
who,  with  some  friends,  was  going  on  a  hunting  excursion  near  Silver  Spring. 
From  his  home  on  the  St.  John's  by  land  across  to  Silver  Spring,  it  was  only  at 
best  forty  miles ;  but  by  the  only  practicable  route  he  was  compelled  to  travel 
175  miles,  and  spend  three  entire  days  on  the  road. 

Silver  Spring  is  certainly  one  of  the  wonders  of  the  world.  The  tradition 
that  it  is  the  "Fountain  of  Youth,"  of  which  the  aborigines  spoke  so  enthusiast- 
ically to  Ponce  de  Leon,  seems  firmly  founded.    The  river  or  spring  rises  suddenly 


The  "Marion"  at  Silver  Spring. 

from  the  ground,  and  after  running  nine  miles  through  foliage-shrouded  banks, 
more  luxuriantly  beautiful  than  poet's  wildest  dream,  empties  into  the  Oclawaha. 
Transparent  to  the  very  bottom,  the  waters  show  one,  at  the  depth  of  thirty  or 
forty  feet,  the  bottom  of  this  wonderful  basin,  with  bubbles  here  and  there 
denoting  one  of  the  sources ;  and  the  refraction  of  the  rays  of  light  produces 
most  brilliant  effects. 

We  rowed  about  on  the  bosom  of  this  fairy  spring,  quite  overcome  with  the 
strangeness  of  the  scene.  There  is  nothing  like  it  elsewhere  either  in  Europe  or 
America ;  the  foliage  is  even  more  gorgeously  tropical  than  along  the  Oclawaha, 
and  its  arrangement  is  more  dainty  and  poetic.  We  spent  hours  rocking  in  little 
skiffs  among  the  oases  of  lily  pods  which  extend  along  the  borders  of  the  spring ; 
or  in  threading  the  forests  which  set  boldly  out  into  the  tranquil  stream,  not 


SILVER      SPRING     TO      OKAHUMKEE  —  LAKE     APOPKA.  413 

without  occasional  misgivings  as  to  the  quantity  and  temper  of  the  alligators  that 
might  be  lurking  there. 

Nothing  befell  us,  save  headaches  from  the  too  zealous  sun.  The  ther- 
mometer confessed  to  90  degrees,  and  the  little  boat  seemed  to  bake  as  she  lay 
at  the  wharf  receiving  cotton  bales  and  bags  of  cotton-seed  from  Ocala,  Marion 
county's  principal  town,  and  from  its  surroundings.  The  planters  and  the 
negroes  from  the  neighborhood,  each  superintending  the  loading  of  his  own 
cotton,  formed  a  lively  group  under  the  wharf-shed  at  Silver  Spring.  The  tiny 
steamer  was  by  no  means  equal  to  the  task  demanded  of  it,  and  left  great  quan- 
tities of  freight  awaiting  its  return.  Half  concealed  among  the  tall,  rustling 
flags,  we  sat  in  our  boat  watching  the  grimy  negroes  as  they  tussled  with  the 
cotton ;  the  young  Floridians  practicing  at  the  curlews  and  the  herons  with 
their  revolvers ;  and  the  wonderful  dreamy  green  of  the  foliage,  through  which 
peered  hundreds  of  strange  plants  and  flowers. 

Silver  Spring  was  once  considered  the  head  of  navigation  in  this  direction,  but 
steamers  now  run  far  beyond  it  on  the  Oclawaha,  through  lakes  Griffin,  Eustis, 
Harris,  and  Dora,  to  Okahumkee,  a  little  settlement  in  the  wilderness,  where 
sportsmen  delight  to  spend  much  of  their  time  while  in  the  peninsula.  All  the 
lands  near  the  lakes  are  specially  valuable  for  cane- growing,  and  for  cotton,  corn 
and  fruit.  In  the  vicinity  of  Lake  Harris,  frost  is  seldom  known  ;  and  sugar- 
cane matures  so  as  to  tassel,  which  the  early  frost  never  permits  it  to  do  in 
Louisiana  and  Texas. 

Colonel  Hart,  of  Palatka,  was  the  explorer  of  this  region,  and  when  his 
adventurous  steamer  pushed  up  through  the  encumbered  channel,  the  crew  had 
to  combat  sunken  logs,  fallen  trees,  and  labyrinths  of  overhanging  limbs.  Then 
"  floating  islands  "  were  encountered,  formed  of  water-flags  securely  rooted  in  a 
soil  under  which  the  current  had  made  its  way.  These  islands  are  sometimes 
borne  down  into  the  larger  streams  by  the  winds  and  the  rising  of  the  waters ; 
and  those  which  had  become  stationary  in  the  river  channel  were  so  tough  that 
a  saw  was  required  to  cut  them  in  pieces. 

This  whole  lake  region  seems  gradually  becoming  a  marsh,  and  much  labor 
and  expense  is  required  to  keep  the  channel  open  as  far  as  Okahumkee.  A  pro- 
ject for  cutting  a  canal  through  to  the  Gulf  by  this  route,  taking  advantage  of  the 
lakes  and  their  outlets,  has  been  conceived,  and  would  be  of  great  commercial 
importance  to  Florida.  The  country  around  Lake  Apopka,  the  source  of  the 
Oclawaha  river,  is  considered  one  of  the  most  remarkable  in  Florida,  and 
cannot  fail  when  communication  is  more  thoroughly  established,  to  attract  large 
numbers  of  immigrants.  At  Okahumkee  the  waters  divide,  running  into  the 
Gulf  by  way  of  Lake  Pansoffkee  and  the  Withlacoochee  rivers — the  route  of  the 
contemplated  ship  canal  across  the  State.  The  Oclawaha  is  navigable  for  about 
250  miles,  and  a  semi-weekly  line  of  small  steam-packets  gives  the  up-country 
connection  with  the  outer  world.  A  charter  has  been  obtained  for  the  "  Great 
Southern  "  railroad  to  run  from  Augusta,  Georgia,  via  Millen  and  Jessup  in  that 
State,  to  Jacksonville  in  Florida — thence  to  Palatka,  and  soon  to  Key  Biscayne 
Bay  and  Key  West.  A  large  land  grant  from  the  State  has  been  accorded  the 
27 


4H 


WHAT     THE      CAPTAIN      OF      THE      "MARION         SAID, 


projectors,  and  the  work  of  laying  down  the  track  from  Jessup  to  Jacksonville 
has  been  contracted. 

Our  captain,  the  cheery  and  active  skipper  of  the  "  Marion,"  had  navigated 
the  Oclawaha  river  for  nearly  a  quarter  of  the  century,  and  his  pilot,  formerly 
his  slave,  still  stands  at  the  helm,  a  post  requiring  no  small  skill  in  view  of  the 
sharp  turns  which  the  "  Marion"  is  compelled  to  make  to  avoid  being  ignomini- 
ously  stuck  fast  in  the  swamp  thickets.  The  captain  expressed  himself  better 
satisfied,   on  the   whole,   with  free   than  slave   labor;  thought   that  it  released 


Shooting  at  Alligators.     [Page  415.] 

employers  like  himself  from  a  great  many  obligations.  But  he  said  that  the 
sudden  advent  of  emancipation  had  greatly  hindered  the  development  of  hun- 
dreds of  plantations  along  the  Oclawaha,  chiefly  because  the  planters  did  not 
wish  to  encourage  more  negroes  to  come  into  the  country,  as  they  were  already 
so  formidable  a  political  element.  Planters  cannot  work  their  broad  acres  without 
the  very  immigration  which  they  dread,  and  so  they  suffer  them  to  lie  idle.  But 
industrial  progress  had  been  very  marked  in  many  things  since  the  war.  A  few 
manufactories  scattered  through  some  of  the  rich  counties  traversed  by  these 
steamers  would,  he  thought,  add  greatly  to  the  wealth  of  those  sections.  People 
suffered  a  great  deal  from  the  large  prices  which  they  were  obliged  to  pay  for 


AN     ALLIGATOR     HUNTER'S     STORY.  415 

manufactured  articles  brought  many  hundreds  of  miles,  in  a  toilsome  manner, 
from  the  outer  world. 

Sailing  back,  we  were  treated  to  the  sight  of  an  alligator  fifteen  feet  long, 
sunning  himself  on  a  hummock  of  yellow  grass.  The  wrinkle  underneath  his 
lower  jaw  gave  him  a  good-humored  look,  and  he  seemed  actually  to  smile  as 
the  bullets  hissed  around  him.  The  alligator  is  by  no  means  a  trifling  enemy ; 
and  the  Floridian  tells  strange  stories  of  the  creature's  strength,  fleetness,  and 
strategy.  An  alligator  hunter  in  Jacksonville  gave  me  an  idea  of  these  character- 
istics, somewhat  after  the  following  fashion  : 

"  The  'gaiter,  sir,  is  ez  quick  as  lightning,  and  ez  nasty.  He  kin  outswim  a 
deer,  and  he  hez  dun  it,  too ;  he  swims  more  'n  two-thirds  out  o'  water,  and' 
when  he  ketches  you,  sir,  he  jest  wabbles  you  right  over  'n  over,  a  hundred  times, 
or  mo',  sir,  ez  quick  ez  the  wind ;  and  you  're  dead  in  no  time,  sir.  When  a  dog 
sees  one  he  always  begins  to  yelp,  sir,  for  a  'gaiter  is  mighty  fond  of  a  dog  and  a 
nigger,  sir.  Nobody  can't  tell  how  old  them  old  fellows  is,  sir ;  I  reckon  nigh  on 
to  a  hundred  years,  them  biggest  ones.  Thar  's  some  old  devils  in  them  lagoons 
you  see  off  the  St.  John ;  they  lie  thar  very  quiet,  but  it  would  be  a  good  tussle 
if  one  of  you  was  out  thar  in  a  small  boat,  sir.  They  won't  always  fight ;  some- 
times they  run  away  very  meek ;  the  best  way  to  kill  'em  is  to  put  a  ball  in  the 
eye,  sir ;  thar  's  no  use  in  wasting  shot  in  a  'gaiter's  hide.  When  the  boys  wants 
sport,  sir,  they  get  a  long  green  pole,  and  sharpen  it ;  'n  then  they  find  a  'gaiter's 
hole  in  the  marsh,  and  put  the  pole  down  it ;  then  the  'gaiter  he  snaps  at  it,  'n 
hangs  on  to  it,  'n  the  boys  get  together,  'n  pull  him  out,  'n  put  a  rope  aroun'  his 
neck  and  set  him  to  fightin'  with  another  'gaiter.  O  Lord !  reckon  t'  would 
make  yo'  har  curl  to  see  the  tails  fly." 


XLVI. 


THE     UPPER     ST.     JOHN'S — INDIAN     RIVER — KEY     WEST — POLITICS. 

THE     NEW     CONSTITUTION. 

SOUTHWARD  and  up  the  St.  John's  river  from  Palatka,  the  vegetation  becomes 
more  tropical,  the  river  narrowing  so  that  one  can  comfortably  inspect  the 
thickets,  and  widening  out  only  to  be  merged  in  grand  Lake  George,  twelve 
miles  wide,  Dexter's  Lake,  and  Lake  Monroe,  at  Enterprise.  The  steamers  make 
the  run  from  Palatka  to  Enterprise  in  about  twelve  hours.  In  March,  when  the 
flowers  on  the  banks  are  at  their  perfection,  if  the  moonlight  be  brilliant,  do  not 


the  Upper  St.  John's  River,   Florida. 


neglect  the  journey  by  night.  The  glamour  of  the  Southern  moon  throws  an 
enchantment  over  all  the  splendid  foliage  which  makes  it  doubly  bewitching;  the 
lilies  and  barnets  on  the  water,  and  the  palms  and  cypresses  on  shore,  form  perfect 
pictures  which  none  can  forget.  Welaka,  opposite  the  mouth  of  the  Oclawaha, 
was  well  supplied  with  accommodations  for  visitors  before  the  war  destroyed  them. 
There  is  a  grand  hotel  there  now,  near  some  excellent  sulphur  springs ;  and 
Dunn's  Lake,  abounding  in  game,  and  with  many  rich  plantations  on  its  shores  is 


INDIAN      RIVER THE      SPORTSMAN'S      PARADISE.  417 

but  eight  miles  distant.  At  the  southern  end  of  Lake  George  lies  Drayton's 
Island,  where  it  is  said  there  are  some  remarkable  Indian  mounds.  A  barren  rib 
of  land  divides  the  St.  John's  and  the  lake  from  the  Oclawaha.  The  steamers 
dexterously  skim  over  the  dangerous  bar  at  the  southern  extremity  of  Lake 
George,  and  passing  Volusia  and  Fort  Butler,  a  noted  relic  of  the  Indian  wars, 
enter  Dexter's  Lake,  surrounded  by  its  wild  and  seemingly  limitless  marshes  and 
hummocks.  Beyond  this  lake,  the  river  flows  through  a  very  narrow  channel, 
whose  banks  are  clothed  with  the  omnipresent  palm,  the  maiden  cane,  and  the  tall 
sedge  in  the  meadows.  At  Lake  Monroe,  one  lands  at  Enterprise,  where  a  Maine 
man  keeps  a  hotel,  of  which,  and  one  or  two  other  houses,  the  town  consists. 
This  is  a  famous  rendezvous  for  sportsmen  who  are  about  to  visit  the  Indian  river. 
On  the  opposite  shore  is  Mellonville,  a  promising  settlement.  All  along  this  lake 
there  is  superb  hunting  and  fishing ;  and  the  invalid  who  comes  pale  and  racked 
with  a  harrowing  cough,  is,  after  a  few  weeks,  seen  tramping  about  in  the  cool  of 
the  morning  with  gun  and  fishing  rod,  a  very  Nimrod  and  Walton  combined. 

The  source  of  the  St.  John  is  higher  up,  in  some  unknown  marsh,  and  after 
one  has  penetrated  to  Lake  Harney  and  Salt  Lake,  there  is  little  left  to  see  on 
the  noble  stream  which,  at  a  distance  of  nearly  three  hundred  miles  from  its 
mouth,  flows  within  seven  miles  of  the  ocean  into  which  it  empties. 

Indian  river  is  difficult  of  access,  but  swarms  of  travelers  are  now  finding 
their  way  there.  One  of  the  favorite  means  of  reaching  it  is  to  row  from  Enter- 
prise to  Lake  Harney,  and  to  take  a  portage  across  to  Sand  Point.  The  entrance 
from  the  coast  is  decidedly  less  easy  than  from  the  St.  John's ;  the  deepest  of 
the  o,utlets,  Fort  Pierce  channel,  having  rarely  more  than  seven  feet  of  water  at 
high  tide.  The  so-called  river  is  really  an  arm  of  the  sea;  its  waters  are  salt; 
its  westward  shore  was  once  very  highly  cultivated  by  the  Spaniards,  and  it 
could,  with  a  little  renewed  attention,  be  made  one  of  the  richest  garden  spots 
in  America.  The  westward  side  presents  a  sad  panorama  of  ruined  sugar  plan- 
tations and  houses,  of  superb  machinery  lying  idle — and  of  acres  of  wild  orange- 
trees,  which  only  need  transplanting  and  budding  to  produce  fruit  equal  to 
the  best  which  we  receive  from  Havana.  The  sportsman  who  pitches  his  tent 
for  a  few  days  on  the  splendid  camping  ground  of  this  same  shore,  will  see  the 
pelican,  the  cormorant,  the  sea-gull,  and  gigantic  turtles,  many  of  them  weighing 
five  hundred  pounds ;  may  see  the  bears  exploring  the  nests  for  turtles'  eggs ; 
may  "fire-hunt"  the  deer  in  the  forests;  chase  the  alligator  to  his  lair;  shoot 
at  the  "  raft-duck,"  and  fish  from  the  salt-ponds  all  finny  monsters  that  be. 
Hardly  a  thousand  miles  from  New  York,  one  may  find  the  most  delicate  and 
delightful  tropical  scenery,  and  may  dwell  in  a  climate  which  neither  Hawaii  nor 
Southern  Italy  can  excel.  Settlements  throughout  this  section  are  few  and  far 
between.  The  mail  is  carried  down  the  great  silent  coast  by  a  foot- messenger — 
for  there  is  a  stretch  of  nearly  one  hundred  miles  along  which  there  is  not  a  drop 
of  fresh  water  for  a  horse  to  drink. 

The  islands  extending  along  the  south  coast,  from  Cape  Florida  to  the  "  Dry 
Tortugas,"  lie  close  to  the  Gulf  Stream,  and  between  the  mainland  and  the 
dangerous  reefs  on  which  so  many  vessels  are  annually  wrecked.     They  are  only 


4l8  BISCAYNE     BAY  —  THE     LABOR     QUESTION  —  KEY     WEST. 

a  few  feet  above  tide -water,  and  are  wooded  with  the  mangrove,  the  bay,  the 
palmetto,  the  oak,  the  cocoa  and  the  pine-apple  tree,  all  of  which  thrive  in  the 
rocky  soil  of  these  keys.  A  large  trade  is  here  carried  on  in  the  gathering  of 
sponges  and  turtles.  The  traveler  in  search  of  health  will  find  a  pleasant  recre- 
ation in  sailing  about  Biscayne  Bay,  and  penetrating  thence  into  the  vast 
shallow  lakes  of  the  "Everglades,"  where  a  thousand  islands  are  covered  with  a 
wealth  of  live  oaks  and  cocoas,  and  with  masses  of  trailing  vines,  on  which,  in 
the  season,  hang  gigantic  clusters  of  grapes.  There  one  may  see  miles  of  flower- 
beds, where  every  conceivable  hue  greets  the  eye;  and  will  find  some  of  the  rich- 
est lands  in  the  world  lying  idle,  and  to  be  purchased  for  a  trifle.  North  of 
Biscayne  Bay,  on  the  coast,  tobacco,  bananas,  plantains,  oranges,  coffee,  dates, 
pine-apples,  rice,  indigo,  sugar  and  cassava  will  flourish  admirably.  The  produc- 
tion of  sea-island  cotton  on  the  Florida  coast  requires  but  about  one-half  the 
labor  necessary  in  South  Carolina,  and  it  is  contended  that  a  sugar  plantation 
there  can  be  made  for  one-fifth  of  the  money  required  in  Louisiana.  Biscayne 
Bay  is  within  four  days'  easy  sail  of  New  York,  and  there  is  no  reason  why 
vegetables  and  the  great  variety  of  tropical  fruits  which  can  be  grown  there 
should  not  find  a  ready  market  in  the  metropolis. 

Of  course,  the  labor  question  in  Florida,  as  elsewhere  in  the  Southern  States, 
is  perplexing  and  startling.  The  only  means  by  which  the  State  can  secure  the 
full  development  of  its  extraordinary  riches  is  by  inducing  immigration  on  the 
part  of  people  who  live  in  similar  latitudes,  and  who  will  find  it  agreeable  and 
easy  to  develop  the  resources  of  the  vast  sub-tropical  peninsula.  While  it  is 
evident  that  Northern  and  Western  people  will  develop  the  region  bordering 
on  the  St.  John's,  and  possibly  the  northern  part  of  the  commonwealth,  those 
who  do  the  work  on  the  vast  sugar  plantations  of  the  future,  and  who  develop 
the  whole  south-eastern  coast,  must  be  native  to  the  South.  The  Floridians 
have  already  given  some  attention  to  the  subject  of  immigration,  and  a  bureau 
to  take  charge  of  that  matter  was  appointed  under  the  new  Constitution.  The 
"Agricultural  and  Immigration  Association  of  Florida"  was  organized  in  1868, 
and  is  composed  of  the  officers  of  the  county  associations  of  the  same  nature, 
and  of  those  of  the  various  boards  of  trade. 

Key  West,  only  a  short  distance  from  Cuba,  is  an  important  Government 
naval  station,  and  is  connected  with  the  world  by  semi-monthly  steamship  to 
Baltimore,  Havana,  and  New  Orleans ;  semi-weekly  to  Galveston  and  New  York, 
and  by  the  United  States  dispatch  boats  to  Fort  Jefferson,  Tampa,  Cedar  Keys, 
St.  Mark's,  Appalachicola,  Pensacola,  and  Mobile.  One  may  stand  on  a  cracker- 
box  and  look  over  the  whole  island,  which  is  formed  of  a  species  of  coralline 
limestone.  Key  West  town  is  prettily  situated  amid  "  groves  of  cocoa  and  of 
palm;"  has  five  thousand  inhabitants;  becomes  quite  lovely  in  aspect  when  the 
fleet  rendezvous  is  fixed  there ;  is  famous  for  the  beauty  of  its  ladies,  the  match- 
less flavor  of  its  green-turtle,  the  dexterity  of  its  wreckers,  the  extent  of  its  salt 
works  and  cigar  manufactories,  its  naval  hospital  and  its  formidable  Fort  Taylor, 
with  two  hundred  heavy  guns  pointing  seaward.  All  winter  long  at  Key  West* 
*  The  name  Key  West  is  a  corruption  of  the  Spanish  Cayo  Hueso,  "Bone  Key." 


POLITICS      IN      FLORIDA. 


419 


the  south  winds  blow;  the  air  is  loaded  with  warmth  and  perfume;  the  moonlight 
is  brilliant,  and  the  "  northers  "  considerately  come  only  two  or  three  times  a 
year.  From  this  port  steamers  run  occasionally  to  the  Dry  Tortugas,  where 
a  thousand  prisoners  were  confined  during  the  war,  and  where  the  "  conspirators  " 
found  a  forced  seclusion. 

Florida  accepted  reconstruction  peacefully,  and  the  new  Constitution  is,  on  the 
whole,  a  good  one.  It  makes  proper  provision  for  schools,  and  the  management  of 
the  courts  and  the  provisions  with  regard  to  the  distribution  of  lands  are  wise. 


Sunrise  at  Enterprise,  St.   John's  River,   Florida. 


The  Republican  party  of  the  State  has  suffered  a  good  deal  at  the  hands  of  some 
of  the  men  who  have  been  intrusted  with  its  interest,  so  that  many  citizens  of 
the  State  who,  on  national  questions,  always  vote  with  Republicans,  array  them- 
selves so  far  as  regards  their  local  interests  with  the  Conservative  faction.  The 
balance  of  power  in  the  State  is  at  present  held  by  the  blacks,  led  by  a  few  white 
men;  but  the  Conservative  element  is  rapidly  gaining  strength,  and  it  is  noted  as 
somewhat  remarkable  that  Northerners  who  settle  there  gradually  find  them- 
selves leaning  to  Conservatism,  as  they  are  compelled  to  do  to  protect  themselves 
against  a  torrent  of  ignorance  and  vice.  Congressman  Cox,  of  New  York,  was 
one  day  at  a  Republican  meeting  at  Jacksonville,  and  was  invited  to  address  it. 
He  professed  great  surprise,  and  inquired  how  it  was  "  that  a  Democrat  was 
asked  to  make  an  address  in  a  Republican  caucus?"  He  was  thereupon  informed 
that  it  was  not  a  party  meeting,  but  that  it  was  an  effort  to  secure  the  best  men 
and  the  best  ideas  for  the  service  of  the  State,  even  if  they  were  found  outside 
party  limits.  There  has  been  a  great  deal  of  fraud  and  plundering  on  the  part  of 
county  officers  who,  dazzled  by  the  possession  of  newly  acquired  power,  have  not 
hesitated  to  put  both  hands  into  the  public  purse.  Many  have  been  detected, 
but  some  have  been  so  adroit  as  to  completely  cloak  their  iniquities.  A  firm  and 
thoroughly  honest  administration  of  State  affairs  would  bring  Florida  into  front 
rank  among  the  prosperous  States  in  a  short  time. 

Taxation  is  about  $2.38  on  every  hundred,  but  the  property  owner  is  allowed 
to  fix  his  own  valuation.  This  includes  a  school  and  county  tax  amounting  to 
one  cent  on  a  dollar.  The  various  railroad  enterprises  into  which  the  State  has 
been  urged  have  done  considerable  to  embarrass  it.  The  present  State  debt  is 
nearly  $1,350,000,   exclusive  of  a  contingent  liability  of  $4,000,000  of  bonds, 


420  RAILROAD      MATTERS — PROGRESS      OF      EDUCATION. 

issued  by  the  State  to  those  insincere  adventurers  who  pretended  that  they 
desired  to  complete  the  Jacksonville,  Pensacola  and  Mobile  railroad.  This 
important  route  is  now  finished  to  the  town  of  Chattahoochee,  in  Florida,  the 
location  of  the  State  Penitentiary.  The  road  would  be  of  great  advantage  to 
the  State,  if  it  were  possible  to  get  it  freed  from  the  endless  litigation  surround- 
ing it,  and  to  put  even  the  section  which  is  already  completed  into  decent 
running  order. 

It  was  an  enterprise  of  too  much  magnitude  for  the  capital  or  the  management 
of  the  clever  adventurer  who  got  it  into  his  possession,  and  who  obtained  every- 
thing that  he  desired  from  the  reconstruction  legislature.  He  having  sunk 
beneath  its  weight,  without  having  made  the  tremendous  progress  anticipated, 
the  project  languishes.  An  act  of  the  last  Legislature  but  one  has  prohibited 
the  further  issuing  of  bonds  for  any  purpose  whatever.  The  Administration 
of  Governor  Stearns  has  thus  far  been  satisfactory. 

At  the  period  of  my  visit  to  Florida,  the  State  Superintendent  of  Education 
was  a  negro,  and  a  gentleman  of  considerable  culture  and  capacity.  But  neither 
he  nor  his  predecessors  had  succeeded  in  doing  much  for  common  schools.  The 
same  prejudice  which  existed  against  them  elsewhere  in  the  South  was  felt  in 
Florida  up  to  a  very  recent  date ;  and  possibly  exists  in  some  degree  now, 
because  of  the  lurking  fear  of  the  whites  that  some  day  mixed  schools  may  be 
insisted  upon  by  the  black  masters  of  the  situation.  In  such  counties  as  Duval, 
where  the  influence  of  a  large  and  flourishing  town  has  been  felt,  there  are  many 
schools,  well  supplied  and  well  taught ;  but  as  a  rule,  throughout  the  back- 
country,  there  are  no  schools,  and  there  is  no  immediate  prospect  of  any.  The 
scrip  which  came  to  Florida,  as  her  share  of  the  national  gift  for  the  founding  of 
an  agricultural  college,  was  swallowed  up  by  some  financial  sharks  in  New  York;  it 
amounted  to  more  than  $80,000.  The  establishment  of  such  a  college  would 
have  been  of  great  value  to  the  State,  giving  an  impetus  to  effort  in  exactly  the 
necessary  direction. 

The  educational  affairs  of  each  county  are  managed  by  a  "  board  of  public 
instruction,"  consisting  of  five  men  recommended  by  the  representatives  of 
the  Legislature,  and  appointed  by  the  State  Superintendent.  There  are  about 
700,000  acres  of  "  school-lands  "  in  the  State,  and  there  are  some  funds  which 
are  used  in  aiding  counties  to  start  schools.  There  are  about  63,000  pupil- 
children  in  the  State,  not  more  than  one-fourth  of  whom  are  supplied  with 
good  facilities  for  instruction.  The  amount  annually  expended  for  free  education 
by  the  State,  including  donations  from  the  Peabody  fund,  is  $100,000.  It 
was  claimed  that  in  1873,  18,000  children  attended  the  schools.  At  Gaines- 
ville, Key  West,  Tallahassee,  Pensacola,  and  Madison,  there  are  successful 
schools  for  both  colored  and  white  children,  and  at  Ocala,  Quincy,  and  Appa- 
lachicola,  there  are  colored  free  schools,'  liberally  aided  by  the  Peabody  bequest. 

In  the  backwoods  there  is  an  alarming  amount  of  ignorance  among  the 
adults ;  there  are  hundreds  of  men  and  women  who  have  not  the  simplest  rudi- 
ments of  education,  and  many  amusing  stories  are  told  of  the  simplicity  and  boor- 
ishness  of  the  "crackers."    They  are  a  soft- voiced,  easy-going,  childlike  kind  of 


THE      "CRACKERS"  —  THE     PRESENT     CONSTITUTIO: 


421 


folk,  quick  to  anger,  vindictive  when  their  rage  is  protracted  and  becomes  a 
feud ;  and  generous  and  noble  in  their  rough  hospitality.  But  they  live  the 
most  undesirable  of  lives,  and,  surrounded  by  every  facility  for  a  luxurious 
existence,  subsist  on  "  hog  and  hominy,"  and  drink  the  meanest  whiskey. 

The  Florida  Constitution,  adopted  under  reconstruction,  contains  some  novel 
features.  One  clause  provides  that  the  Legislature  shall  enact  laws  requiring  edu- 
cational qualifications  for  electors  after  the  year  1880,  but  that  no  such  law  shall 
be  made  applicable  to  any  elector  who  may  have  registered  and  voted  at  any 
election  previous  to  that  time.  The  Governor  is  elected  for  four  years.  The 
blacks  predominate  in  the  tiny  Senate  and  Assembly,  composed  of  twenty-four 
and  fifty-three  members,  respectively ;  and  during  the  sessions,  Tallahassee,  the 
capital,  situated  in  a  rolling  country,  in  the  midst  of  a  beautiful  spring  region, 
is  the  scene  of  tyro  legislation  such  as  at  present  distinguishes  the  capitals  of 
Louisiana  and  South  Carolina. 

Quincy,  St.  Mark's,  and  Monticello,  all  offer  attractions  to  the  traveler; 
the  latter  is  the  site  of  a  sanguinary  fight  between  the  forces  under  General 
Jackson  and  the  Miccosakie  Indians,  and  there,  too,  De  Soto  is  said  to  have 
encamped  on  his  way  to  the  northward. 


A  Country  Cart. 


XLVII. 

SOUTH     CAROLINA — PORT     ROYAL THE      SEA     ISLANDS. 

THE     REVOLUTION. 

PORT  ROYAL,  in  South  Carolina,  was  once  first  cousin  to  Plymouth  Rock, 
in  Massachusetts.  The  rugged  New  England  headland  was  the  refuge 
and  the  fortress  of  the  English  Puritan;  the  fertile  plain  at  the  mouth  of  the 
broad  and  noble  Carolinian  river  was  the  resort  of  the  French  Huguenot, 
who  preferred  exile  and  danger  to  the  sacrifice  of  his  faith.  Jean  Ribault  and 
his  hardy  men-at-arms,  sailing  northward  from  the  blooming  banks  of  Florida, 
in  1562,  anchored  their  ships  during  a  great  storm  at  the  mouth  of  a  "fair 
and  large  harbor,"  and  named  it,  and  the  river  emptying  into  it,  Port 
Royal. 

The  good  Frenchmen  who  had  been  sent  by  brave  old  Admiral  Col- 
igny  to  found  an  asylum  for  the  oppressed  in  the  New  World,  wandered 
delightedly  along  the  shores  of  the  stream,  under  moss-grown  oaks  and  lofty 
pines,  beneath  the  cedars  and  the  palmettoes,  and  shaped  visions  of  future 
glory.  They  pictured  to  themselves  the  time  when  the  waters  of  the  vast 
harbor  should  be  covered  with  noble  fleets ;  when  spacious  gardens  should 
dot  the  luxuriant  shores ;  and,  after  a  few  days  of  repose,  they  raised  a  stately 
pillar  of  stone,  with  the  arms  of  France  graven  on  it,  and  in  honor  of  Charles  IX., 
\)n\t  a  fort  on  an  island  in  the  river.  A  little  garrison  was  placed  in  charge, 
and  Ribault  returned  to  France,  to  recount  with  enthusiasm  the  wonders  of  that 
part  of  the  then  province  of  Florida,  destined  in  future  to  be  named,  as  the 
Frenchman  called  his  fort,  Carolina. 

To-day,  more  than  three  centuries  after  Ribault's  adventurous  voyage,  the 
site  of  the  old  fort  and  pillar  is  not  even  definitely  known.  Port  Royal  is  an 
infant  town  just  springing  into  commercial  activity,  under  the  influence  of 
slowly  reviving  commerce ;  and  the  negro  slouchingly  tills  the  soil  and  lounges 
in  the  sun  on  the  shores  from  which  the  tide  of  revolution  has  swept  his  late 
master. 

In  the  sixteenth  century,  the  country  claimed  in  America  by  the  Spaniards 
as  Florida,  and  by  the  French  as  "  New  France,"  was  supposed  to  extend  from 
the  Chesapeake  to  the  "Tortugas,"  along  the  coast,  and  inland  as  far  as  the 
exploring  foreigners  might  choose  to  penetrate.  During  many  perilous  years  the 
States  now  known  as  Florida  and  South  Carolina  had  a  common  history.  The 
Huguenots  continued  their  explorations  until  the  treachery  and  murderous  fury 
of  the  Spaniards  had  exterminated  all  of  them  who  ventured  into  the  Florida 
lands;  and  had  Menendez  of  Avila,  the  blackest  villain  whose  life-record  blots 


THE      HUGUENOTS     AT     PORT      ROYAL.  423 

the  annals  of  American  discovery,  died  in  his  cradle,  South  Carolina  would, 
perhaps,  at  this  day  have  been  peopled  by  Protestant  Gauls. 

The  little  settlement  at  Port  Royal  suffered  many  ills.  The  soldiers  left  by 
Ribault,  borne  down  by  misfortune  and  sickness,  determined  to  return  home. 
The  Indians  aided  the  soldiers  to  construct  a  brigantine,  with  which  the  miserable 
men  tried  to  make  their  way  to  France  ;  but  they  were  reduced  to  starvation  on 
the  voyage,  and  it  was  only  after  they  had  begun  to  eat  each  other,  that  the 
survivors  were  rescued  by  an  English  vessel. 

The  settlement  founded  by  Ribault  was  thus  abandoned ;  and  two  years  elapsed 
before  another  Huguenot  expedition,  led  by  Laudonniere,  founded  a  settlement 
near  the  mouth  of  the  river  May,  as  the  St.  John's,  prince  of  the  streams  of 
Florida,  was  then  called.  Had  Laudonniere  prospered,  the  Port  Royal  fort  might 
have  been  rebuilt ;  but  the  Spaniards  from  St.  Augustine,  who  fell  upon  both 
Laudonniere  and  the  re-enforcements  which  Ribault  had  brought  him,  rendered 
the  second  of  Coligny's  attempts  disastrous.  Even  the  colossal  vengeance  which 
that  preux  chevalier,  Dominique  de  Gourgues,  took  upon  the  Spaniards  in  Florida, 
two  years  afterward,  did  not  establish  French  influence  there ;  and  no  Huguenot 
came  again  to  our  Southern  shores  until  one  hundred  and  thirty  years  later, 
when  the  revocation  of  the  edict  of  Nantes  in  France  sent  hundreds  of  the 
descendants  of  Coligny's  followers  to  South  Carolina.  Their  illustrious  names 
are  still  borne  by  many  worthy  families  in  Charleston. 

Under  the  "Palatinate"  the  development  of  the  province  now  known  as 
South  Carolina  was  begun.  Under  a  charter  from  the  crown,  after  the  Restora- 
tion, all  the  lands  lying  between  the  31st  and  the  36th  degrees  of  north  latitude 
were  granted  to  a  proprietary  government. 

The  utmost  religious  liberty  prevailed  in  the  newly-organized  province.  The 
Constitution,  under  which  the  noble  dukes  and  earls  who  had  received  the  charter 
proposed  that  their  colonists  should  live,  was  framed  by  the  philosopher,  John 
Locke.  The  eldest  of  the  "lords  proprietors"  was  Palatine,  the  seven  other 
chief  officers  were  Admiral,  Chamberlain,  Chancellor,  Constable,  Chief  Justice, 
High-  Steward  and  Treasurer.  The  province  was  subdivided  into  counties, 
signories,  baronies,  precincts  and  colonies.  Each  signory,  barony  and  colony 
consisted  of  12,000  acres,  and  it  was  provided  that  after  a  certain  term  of  years 
the  "proprietors"  should  not  have  power  to  alienate  or  make  over  their  proprie- 
torship, but  that  "it  should  descend  unto  their  heirs  male."  Here  was  a  good 
foundation  for  a  landed  aristocracy.  Every  freeman  of  Carolina  was  authorized 
to  "have  absolute  power  and  authority  over  his  negro  slaves;"  and  no  person 
could  hold  or  claim  any  land  in  the  province  except  from  and  under  the  "lords 
proprietors." 

The  first  attempt  of  the  English  experimenters  to  settle  the  country  was  at 
Port  Royal,  in  1670.  William  Sayle  was  appointed  Governor  of  the  colony,  and 
great  inducements  were  offered  to  English  immigrants.  The  first  site  of 
"  Charlestown  "  was  on  the  western  bank  of  the  Ashley  river,  and  the  estate 
where  that  site  was  is  still  known  as  "Old  Town."  Subsequently  the  settle- 
ment was  removed  to  the  confluence  of  the  Ashley  and  Cooper  rivers. 


424   THE   FOUNDING  OF  CHARLESTON THE   CAROLINIANS   OF   OLD. 

It  was  not  until  1783  that  the  town  was  incorporated.  The  original  expedi- 
tion of  the  proprietary  government  cost  £1 2,000,  and  in  the  years  between  1670 
and  1682,  100  houses  were  built  at  "  Charlestown,"  and  an  ancient  chronicler 
adds  that  many  who  went  there  as  servants  had  become  worth  several  hundreds 
of  pounds,  with  their  estates  still  increasing. 

The  Constitution  which  Locke  had  framed,  after  the  pattern  of  Plato's  model 
Republic,  was  sufficient  for  the  Carolinians  only  until  1693,  and  in  17 19  Carolina 
put  itself  under  the  protection  of  King  George. 

As  a  colony,  a  rapid  development  and  a  large  prosperity  were  experienced  at 
once,  and  the  people  began  to  turn  their  attention  to  their  superb  material 
resources  with  a  vigor  never  before  manifested. 

One  century  after  the  granting  of  the  charter  by  Charles  the  Second  to  the 
proprietors,  Carolina  had  arisen  to  considerable  commercial  eminence.  "  Charles- 
town,"  Beaufort,  Purysburg,  Jacksonborough,  Dorchester,  Camden  and  George- 
town were  the  principal  settlements,  but  no  one,  save  the  first,  consisted  of  more 
than  thirty  or  forty  dwellings.  The  negroes  already  outnumbered  the  whites. 
In  Charleston  they  were  as  eight  to  five ;  and  while  the  white  population  of  the 
colony  did  not  exceed  40,000,  the  negroes  numbered  80,000  or  90,000. 

At  that  time  it  was  said  of  the  whites  that,  "  in  the  progress  of  society  they 
had  not  advanced  beyond  that  period  in  which  men  were  distinguished  more  by 
their  external  than  internal  accomplishments."  They  were  chiefly  known  in 
England  "  by  the  number  of  their  slaves,  the  value  of  their  annual  produce,  or 
the  extent  of  their  landed  estates."  They  were  lively  and  gay;  "  all  novelties  in 
fashion,  ornament  and  dress  were  quickly  introduced,  and  even  the  spirit  of 
luxury  and  extravagance,  too  common  in  England,"  was  beginning  to  creep 
among  them.  It  was  said  that  "  there  were  more  people  possessed  of  five  and 
ten  thousand  pounds  sterling  in  the  province  "  than  were  to  be  found  anywhere 
else  among  the  same  number  of  persons.  "Their  rural  life  and  their  constant 
use  of  arms"  kept  up  a  martial  spirit  among  them.  The  Indians  hated  the 
negroes,  and  there  was,  consequently,  no  danger  of  their  conspiring  together. 
The  Carolina  merchant  was  a  ?.  honest,  industrious,  and  generous  man. 

The  province  readily  obtained  all  the  credit  it  demanded ;  the  staples  which  it 
produced  were  very  valuable,  and  agriculture  and  trade  were  constantly  enlarged 
in  their  scope  by  the  importations  of  ship-loads  of  negroes.  A  little  before  the 
time  of  the  American  revolution,  the  exports  from  "  Carolina  "  in  a  single  year 
amounted  to  £756,000  sterling;  but  the  imports  were  so  extensive  that  the 
colony  remained  indebted  to  the  mother  country. 

Still  the  old  English  critics  thought  the  Carolinians  rather  slovenly  husband- 
men, and  were  astonished  at  the  manner  in  which  they  managed  their  estates. 
Freeholds  of  land  were  easily  obtained  by  patent  or  purchase,  and  were  also 
alienable  at  will ;  so  that  the  system  of  husbandry  was  not  carried  on  according 
to  any  established  principles  or  plans.  The  planter  ordinarily  cleared  a  wooded 
tract,  planted  it  with  rice  or  indigo  until  it  was  exhausted,  and  then  neglected  it 
for  a  fresh  location.  Nowhere  was  the  soil  improved,  nowhere  were  grass  seeds 
sown  for  enriching  the  pastures,  and   the  only  study  was   the  putting  of  the 


PORT     ROYAL      ISLAND     AND      BEAUFORT.  425 

largest  crop  into  market.  Safe  and  prosperous,  guaranteed  royal  protection, 
possessing  unlimited  credit  and  indulgence,  and  owning  the  labor  necessary  to 
produce  wealth,  the  Carolinian  of  one  hundred  years  ago  seemed  a  most  fortu- 
nate mortal,  and  his  carelessness  was  accounted  a  princely  quality. 

Port  Royal  Island  and  its  chief  town,  Beaufort,  are  monuments  to  the  dis- 
astrous effects  of  the  revolution  which  has  swept  over  South  Carolina  within  the 
last  generation.  Everywhere  on  the  chain  of  beautiful  sea  islands  along  the  low 
coast  one  finds  the  marks  of  the  overturn.  But  Port  Royal,  situated  on  the 
river  terminating  in  what  is  perhaps  the  grandest  harbor  on  the  American  coast, 
has  hopes,  and  may  bring  new  life  to  decaying  Beaufort. 

A  railroad  has  penetrated  the  low  lands,  creeping  across  marshes  and 
estuaries  upon  formidable  trestles,  and  now  drains  the  rich  cotton-fields  around 
Augusta,  in  Georgia,  toward  the  Broad  river.  The  town  is  laid  out  into  lots, 
and  the  numbers  of  the '  avenues  run  ambitiously  high  already ;  an  English 
steamship  line  has  sent  its  pioneer  vessel  to  the  port ;  and  the  Home  Government 
talks  of  establishing  a  navy-yard  upon  the  stream. 

With  commercial  facilities  which  neither  New  Orleans,  Savannah,  nor 
Norfolk  can  boast,  Port  Royal  deserves  a  great  future.  The  harbor  which 
Ribault  300  years  ago  enthusiastically  described  as  so  large  that  "  all  the  argo- 
sies of  Venice  might  safely  ride  therein,"  is  certainly  ample  for  the  accommo- 
dation of  the  largest  fleets  known,  and  is  easy  and  safe  of  access. 

The  lowland  scenery  of  South  Carolina  is  as  varied  as  tropical.  From  the 
sea  the  marshes,  or  savannahs,  stretching  seventy  miles  back  from  the  coast, 
seem  perfectly  level ;  but  there  are  in  many  places  bluffs  and  eminences  crowned 
with  delicate  foliage.  A  vast  panorama  of  fat  meadows,  watered  by  creeks ;  of 
salt  and  fresh  marshes ;  of  swamp  lands  of  inexhaustible  fertility,  from  which 
spring  the  sugar-cane  and  cypress ;  of  the  rich,  firm  soil,  where  the  oak  and  the 
hickory  stand  in  solid  columns,  and  of  barrens  studded  with  thousands  of  young 
pines — salutes  the  eye. 

The  innumerable  branches  which  penetrate  the  low-lying  lands  from  the  sea 
have  formed  a  kind  of  checker- work  of  island  and  estuary.  The  forests  along 
the  banks  of  the  streams,  and  scattered  on  the  hedges  between  the  marshes,  are 
beautiful.  The  laurel,  the  bay,  the  palmetto,  the  beech,  the  dog-wood,  the 
cherry,  are  overgrown  with  wanton,  luxuriant  vines,  which  straggle  across  the 
aisles  where  the  deer  and  the  fox  still  wander. 

In  the  spring  the  jessamine  and  the  cherry  fill  the  air  with  the  perfume  of 
their  blossoms ;  in  winter  the  noble  oaks,  in  their  garments  of  moss,  and  the 
serried  pines,  preserve  the  verdure  which  the  other  trees  have  lost,  and  give 
to  the  landscape  an  aspect  of  warmth  and  life.  When  the  rice  plantations  are 
submerged,  and  the  green  plants  are  just  showing  their  heads  above  the  water, 
and  nodding  and  swaying  beneath  the  slight  breeze  passing  over  the  hundreds 
of  acres,  the  effect  is  indescribably  novel  and  beautiful. 

Beaufort,  in  a  soft,  delicious  climate,  where  the  orange  flourishes,  is  beautifully 
located,  and  was  once  the  abode  of  hundreds  of  proud  and  wealthy  planters. 
One  reaches  it  by  rail  from  Yemassee,  a  little  junction  in  the  midst  of  a  pine 


426  FROM      YEMASSEE      TO      BEAUFORT. 

forest,  where  the  trains  from  Charleston,  Savannah,  Augusta,  and  Port  Royal  all 
meet  at  midday,  and  indulge  in  delays  which  in  the  North  would  be  thought 
disastrous,  but  which  seem  quite  natural  in  the  slumbrous  climate  of  the 
lowlands. 

The  journey  from  Yemassee  is  through  rich  woods,  and  along  high  ridges ; 
past  newly  cleared  lands,  where  the  freedmen  are  grubbing  for  existence ;  past 
old  and  worn-out  plantations,  now  deserted,  with  no  smoke  curling  upward  from 
the  chimneys  of  the  long  rows  of  negro  cabins,  and  no  signs  of  life  about  the 
huge,  white  mansion  in  the  clump  of  oaks,  or  in  the  centre  of  a  once  lovely 
garden.  At  the  little  station  one  sees  smartly  dressed  men  mounting  fine 
horses,  and  galloping  down  the  long,  straight  avenues  in  the  forests,  to  the  plan- 
tations which  they  own  many  miles  away.  One  also  sees  colored  people  every- 
where, of  every  shade  and  variety,  lounging,  riding,  talking  in  high-pitched 
voices,  and  with  an  accent  which  renders  their  speech  unintelligible  to  the 
stranger. 

Sometimes  a  startled  doe,  followed  by  her  fawns,  bounds  across  the  track. 
There  are  but  few  houses  to  be  seen,  and  they  are  miles  away.  You  catch  a 
glimpse  of  some  mighty  lagoon,  lonely  and  grand;  now  you  are  whirled  into  the 
lonely  forests — along  a  river  bank — across  a  wide  arm  of  the  sea ;  now  through 
swamps  in  which  innumerable  cypress-knees  and  rotting  boughs  seem  like  snakes 
and  monsters  in  the  stagnant  water,  and  now  where  you  note  the  gleam  of  the 
sun  on  the  white  walls  of  some  deserted  Beaufort  mansion. 

The  long  street  by  the  water-side,  in  Beaufort,  was  as  still  when  I  entered  it 
as  if  the  town  were  asleep.  The  only  sign  of  life  was  a  negro  policeman,  dressed 
in  a  shiny  blue  uniform,  pacing  languidly  up  and  down.  But  there  was  not  even 
a  dog  to  arrest.  On  the  pretty  pier  in  front  of  the  Sea  Island  Hotel  two  or  three 
buzzards  were  ensconced  asleep ;  half  way  across  the  stream  a  dredge-boat  was 
hauling  up  phosphates  from  the  channel- bed. 

I  wandered  through  the  town.  It  was  evidently  once  very  beautiful,  and  even 
now  there  are  many  remains  of  the  ancient  beauty.  But  a  silence  as  of  the 
grave  reigned  everywhere.  Many  of  the  mansions  were  closed  and  fallen  into 
decay.  The  old  Episcopal  church,  surrounded  by  a  high  moss-grown  wall, 
seemed  indignantly  to  have  shut  itself  in  from  the  encroachments  of  the 
revolution.  The  whole  aspect  of  the  place  was  that  which  I  afterward  found 
pervading  other  South  Carolinian  towns — that  of  complete  prostration,  dejection, 
stagnation. 

Here  the  revolution  penetrated  to  the  quick.  The  planter,  when  he  returned 
from  his  enforced  exile  during  the  war,  found  that  the  negro  had  installed  him- 
self upon  his  lands,  and  would  not  give  them  up.  A  practical  confiscation  had 
been  operated.  There  was  no  redress;  the  government  was  in  the  hands  of  the 
negroes.  It  is  true  that  they  were  the  majority,  as  they  had  been  for  many 
years  before  they  received  their  civil  rights.  The  victory  of  the  Union  armies 
meant  land  to  these  negroes.  They  had  some  idea  of  vengeance  ;  they  did  not 
care  to  respect  property,  and  hundreds  of  white  families  were  left  homeless, 
moneyless,  and  driven  into  cities  where  they  were  friendless.     The  great  planta- 


THE     ACTS     OF     FORFEITURE NEGRO     GOVERNMENT.  427 

tions  of  sea-island  cotton  were  left  untilled;  the  negro  was  too  busy  with  politics 
to  work ;  and  the  General  Government  was  in  no  mood  for  listening  to  individual 
complaints.  The  "acts  of  forfeiture,"  passed  in  1862,  swept  all  the  lands  in  St. 
Helena  parish  and  thousands  of  acres  on  Port  Royal  Island  into  the  hands  of  the 
United  States  Government,  by  whose  authority  they  were  in  turn  sold  on  long 
time  to  the  negroes,  and  liens  taken  as  security.  The  original  owners  who  dared 
to  return,  protested,*  but  it  was  of  no  avail.  The  lands  have  been  taken  from 
them,  and  the  negro  rules  over  both  them  and  their  lands.  He  and  his  fellows 
dispose  not  only  of  the  revenues  of  Beaufort,  but  of  the  State.  The  idle  and 
vicious  of  his  race  huddle  together  in  gorgeous  parlors,  once  decorated  with  ele- 
gant furniture,  purchased  by  the  planters  with  the  proceeds  of  slave  labor. 

The  City  Hall  is  controlled  by  the  blacks,  and  the  magistrates,  the  police,  and 
the  representatives  in  the  Legislature,  are  nearly  all  Africans.  In  Beaufort  town- 
ship there  are  ten  negroes  to  one  white  person ;  and  in  all  towns  in  the  adjacent 
country  it  is  a  similar  story.  At  Hilton  Head  there  are  about  3,000  colored 
persons  and  hardly  100  whites.  On  St.  Helena's  Island,  still  in  the  same  county, 
there  are  6,000  negroes  and  about  70  whites;  in  Yemassee,  nearly  3,000  blacks 
and  barely  200  whites.  In  the  adjoining  counties,  Colleton  and  Charleston, 
the  proportions  in  the  towns  are  about  the  same,  except  in  Charleston  city. 
On  Edisto  Island  there  are  nearly  3,000  negroes,  and  hardly  any  white 
persons. 

The  blacks  have  formed  communities  by  themselves.  They  have  left  the 
country  and  gone  to  town.  The  result  is  that  in  the  chief  centres  of  every 
township  they  are  immensely  in  the  majority.  They  monopolize  everything. 
Naturally  enough,  they  are  in  possession  of  a  great  deal  which  they  cannot  use. 
They  seem,  especially  on  Port  Royal  Island,  contented  with  a  small  tract  of  land 
on  which  to  raise  cotton,  and  over  which  their  hogs  may  wander.  Some  are  very 
industrious ;  others  never  do  any  work ;  the  masses  are  satisfied  with  getting  a 
living.  They  know  little  about  markets,  surplus  crops,  and  the  accumulation 
of  riches,  and  care  less.  They  love  hunting  and  fishing ;  they  revel  in  the  idle- 
ness which  they  never  knew  until  after  the  war.  But  they  are  cumberers  of  the 
soil ;  their  ignorance  impedes,  their  obstinacy  throttles.  They  are  tools  in  the 
hands  of  the  corrupt.  They  lack  moral  sense,  as  might  have  been  expected, 
after  a  few  generations  of  slavery.  They  are  immoral  and  irresponsible;  emo- 
tional and  unreliable;  not  at  all  unfriendly  in  spirit  toward  the  whites,  their 
old  masters,  yet  by  their  attitude  in  reality  doing  them  deadly  harm. 

*  The  act  of  1862  provided  that  if  a  property  owner  should  fail  to  pay,  within  sixty  days,  the 
amount  assessed  by  the  Land  Commissioners  for  South  Carolina,  appointed  by  the  General 
Government,  "the  title  to  his  land  should  thereupon  become  forfeited  to  the  United  States;" 
and  that  after  such  forfeiture  a  sale  should  follow,  by  which  the  title  should  be  vested  in  the 
purchaser  or  in  the  United  States.  This  act  was,  of  course,  based  upon  the  assumption  that  the 
States  in  which  it  was  operative  were  out  of  the  Union.  Inasmuch  as  the  Land  Commissioners 
for  South  Carolina  did  not  enter  upon  their  duties  until  one  year  after  the  establishment  at  Beau- 
fort of  the  military  and  civil  authority  of  the  Federal  Government,  a  large  number  of  those 
Carolinians  who  have  suffered  by  confiscation  claim  that  the  whole  sale  of  the  lands  is  illegal,  and 
that  the  titles  of  the  present  owners  are  equivocal  and  false. 


428  THE      EFFECTS     OF     THE      REVOLUTION. 

The  undoing  of  the  old  relations  between  the  two  races,  and  the  conferring  of 
political  privileges  upon  him  who  was  formerly  the  inferior,  have  been  the  ruin 
of  certain  sections  of  these  fertile  lowlands.  Neither  race  seems  likely  to 
resume  operations  on  anything  like  the  old  scale  of  grandeur.  The  sea- island 
cotton  crop,  once  a  source  of  such  wealth,  is  small  now,  yet  the  negroes,  with 
industry,  might  raise  immense  crops.  In  1870,  Beaufort  county,  with  150,000 
acres  of  improved  land,  sent  to  market  but  a  little  over  7,000  bales;  it  has 
done  somewhat  better  of  late.  The  culture  has  met  with  some  disasters ; 
caterpillars  and  foul  weather  have  interfered.  The  negroes  usually  plant  a 
little  sea- island  cotton,  no  matter  how  small  may  be  their  farms. 

The  Northern  capitalists  who  have  undertaken  this  difficult  but  once  very 
profitable  culture,  have,  as  a  rule,  sunk  the  better  portion  of  their  invested  capi- 
tal ;  and  the  native  planters  have  gradually  taken  to  planting  a  less  number  of 
acres  yearly.  During  the  three  years  preceding  the  war,  South  Carolina  sent  to 
market  54,904  bales  of  sea-island  cotton ;  but  in  the  three  years  ending  Septem- 
ber 1st,  1873,  only  23,307  bales  were  sent  out.  The  control  of  prices  abroad  has 
also  been  lost  to  the  sea-island  planter  in  South  Carolina,  as,  in  the  days  of 
slavery,  he  carelessly  sold  the  finer  seeds  to  any  one  from  other  countries  who 
wished  to  buy,  and  now  encounters  formidable  foreign  rivalry  in  Egypt,  the 
Sandwich  Islands,  and  in  South  America,  as  well  as  in  our  own  Gulf  States. 

If  a  planter  of  the  days  when  the  royal  colony  of  South  Carolina  was  in  the 
height  of  its  glory  could  return  now,  and  wander  through  the  streets  of  moss- 
grown  Beaufort,  he -would  be  amazed,  but  no  more  so  than  would  the  planter  of 
1850  or  i860,  if  he  too  might  return. 

For  it  would  be  found  that  in  a  decade  and  a-half  one  of  the  most  remarkable 
revolutions  ever  recorded  in  history  has  occurred.  A  wealthy  and  highly  pros- 
perous community  has  been  reduced  to  beggary ;  its  vassals  have  become  its 
lords,  and  dispose  of  the  present  and  pledge  the  future  resources  of  the  State.  In 
ten  years  the  total  valuation  of  the  commonwealth  has  been  reduced  from  nearly 
$500,000,000  to  barely  $150,000,000  at  the  present  time;  the  banking  capital  of 
Charleston  from  $13,000,000  to  $3,000,000;  the  insurance  capital  is  entirely 
destroyed.  The  taxes  have  been  increased  from  $392,000  in  i860,  to  $2,000,000 
in  1870;  slaves  valued  at  $174,000,000  have  been  freed>  and  set  to  learn  the 
arts  of  self-government  and  civilization.  More  than  400,000  blacks  now  inhabit 
the  State,  and  their  number  is  constantly  increasing.  Thousands  of  planters  have 
been  so  utterly  ruined  that  they  can  never  hope  even  to  attain  comfortable 
circumstances  again. 

Opposite  an  elegant  mansion,  on  one  of  the  main  streets  of  Beaufort,  is  a 
small,  unambitious  structure,  in  which  the  former  occupant  of  the  grand  man- 
sion is  selling  goods  at  retail.  He  returned  after  the  capture  of  the  town  to  find 
himself  stripped  of  everything,  and  has  been  living  in  view  of  his  former  splendor 
ever  since.  His  fields  are  held  by  strangers  ;  his  house  is  converted  into  offices. 
In  a  day,  as  it  were,  he  and  thousands  of  others  were  reduced  to  complete 
dependence,  and  compelled  to  live  under  the  government  of  the  ignorant  slaves 
whose  labor  they  had  grown  rich  upon. 


XLVIIL 

ON     A     RICE     PLANTATION     IN     SOUTH     CAROLINA. 

THE  lowlands  of  South  Carolina  are  the  most  interesting  portion  of  the 
State,  in  a  commercial  and  picturesque  point  of  view,  and  there  the 
political  outlook  is  also  most  depressing.  The  masses  of  the  freedmen  and 
women  on  the  sea  islands  and  in  the  sea-board  counties  are  very  ignorant,  and 
vastly  inferior,  in  natural  intelligence  and  ability,  to  the  negro  of  the  upper  and 
middle  sections  of  the  same  State,  or  the  type  met  with  throughout  Virginia, 
Maryland,  Tennessee,  and  Kentucky. 

The  lowland  negro  of  South  Carolina  has  a  barbaric  dialect,  which  no  external 
influences  have  as  yet  impressed  in  the  slightest  degree ;  the  English  words  seem 
to  tumble  all  at  once  from  his  mouth,  and  to  get  sadly  mixed  whenever  he 
endeavors  to  speak.     The  phraseology  is  usually  so  odd,  too,  that  even  after  the 


View  of  a  Rice -field  in  South  Carolina.     [Page  434.] 

stranger  has  become  a  little  accustomed  to  the  thick  tones  of  the  voice  and  the 
awkward  enunciation,  he  cannot  readily  understand.  Certainly  a  Virginian 
negro  from  the  town  could  not  comprehend  these  low-country  people  at  all, 
until  his  ear  had  become  habituated  to  the  apparent  mumbling. 

The  children  of  the  planters,  brought  up  on  the  plantations,  and  allowed  to 

run  in  the  woods  with  the  little  negroes,  acquired  the  same  dialect ;  and  to-day 

many  a  gentleman's  son  regrets  that  it  is  apparent  in  his  speech.     These  negroes 

also  have  their  peculiar  religious  superstitions  and  ceremonies.      I  repeatedly 

28 


430  THE      LOWLAND     NEGROES      IN      SOUTH      CAROLINA. 

asked  planters  in  Beaufort  and  Colleton  counties  if  the  negroes  there  had 
changed  much  in  manners  and  habits  since  their  slave  days,  and  the  invariable 
answer  was,  "  No  !  "  They  have  learned  to  understand  that  the  vote  gives 
power;  they  find  work  in  large  bands  together  on  the  rice  plantations  distaste- 
ful to  them,  and  they  are  perfectly  happy  when  they  succeed  in  obtaining 
an  acre  or  two  of  land,  and  in  erecting  a  cabin.  To  own  a  mule  is  the  acme 
of  bliss. 

The  men  and  women  still  maintain  their  old-time  servility  toward  their  former 
masters.  When  they  meet  them  on  the  roads  the  men  always  touch  their  hats, 
and  the  women,  no  matter  how  huge  the  basket  they  may  happen  to  be  carrying 
upon  their  heads,  courtesy  profoundly.  The  word  "mas'r"  is  still  used,  being 
so  intimately  associated  in  the  negro's  mind  with  certain  individuals,  that  he  has 
no  inclination  to  drop  it. 

Friendliest  exterior  relations  are  maintained  between  ex-master  and  ex-slave, 
as  a  rule ;  and  the  white  Conservatives  sometimes  bitterly  regret  that  they  did 
not  come  boldly  forward,  at  the  outset  of  reconstruction,  and  themselves  guide 
the  negro  votes.  There  would,  at  one  time,  have  been  a  fair  chance  for  such  a 
fusion ;  but  the  races  soon  drifted  into  a  separate  political  current,  and  the 
negro  appeared  in  his  present  role  of  corrupt  and  ignorant  legislator.  At  present, 
the  whites  cannot  get  a  fair  hearing,  and  are  subject  to  many  tyrannies  at  the 
hands  of  negro  justices  and  constables. 

There  are  honorable  exceptions  to  all  the  general  criticisms  which  may  be 
made  upon  the  character  of  the  lowland  negro ;  but,  as  a  mass,  the  race  is  really 
very  degraded.  It  is  making  gradual  progress  toward  a  condition  of  independ- 
ence; yet  ignorance  and  irresponsibility  are  still  the  rule.  The  marriage 
relation  is  almost  unknown  in  many  of  the  lowland  counties ;  men  and  women 
live  together  as  long  as  they  can  agree,  and  are  called  husband  and  wife. 

Passing  through  a  rice-field  one  morning,  in  which  there  were,  perhaps,  four 
hundred  black  men  and  women  at  work,  I  requested  the  owner  of  the  plantation, 
whom  I  accompanied,  to  ask  four  men,  who  were  sitting  by  a  rice  stack  awaiting 
a  barge,  some  leading  question  calculated  to  throw  light  on  their  morality.  Each 
of  the  four  had  had  two  "wives,"  as  they  termed  it;  one  of  the  oldest  had 
had  four.  The  causes  of  separation  were  various — infidelity,  abuse,  a  hasty 
word,  or  laziness.  The  children  who  were  the  fruit  of  these  careless  unions 
were  kept  by  either  father  or  mother,  as  the  couple  might  agree. 

Jealousy  is  a  terrible  passion  among  these  people,  and  sometimes  leads  to 
capital  crime.  All,  without  exception,  are  religious;  they  find  a  temporary  relief 
and  an  excitement  in  the  "  meetings,"  and  will  go  to  one,  no  matter  how  distant 
it  may  be.  Most  of  the  men  are  armed ;  they  manage  to  secure  a  pistol  or  a  gun, 
and  are  as  fond  of  hunting  as  their  white  employers.  The  situation  of  those 
gentlemen  who  had  been  slave-holders  and  large  planters  before  the  war,  was 
dreadful  for  a  year  or  two  after  the  fall  of  the  Confederacy.  The  freedmen  were 
difficult  to  manage,  could  not  be  got  to  work,  and  were  jealous  of  anything  which 
seemed  like  an  attempt  to  get  them  back  to  their  old  places.  The  intervention 
of  soldiery  was  constantly  necessary  to  keep  the  peace. 


TROUBLES      OF      PLANTER     AND      LABORER. 


431 


The  low-country  planter  lived  in  a  luxurious  but  careless  way.  Although 
some  few  were  ignorant,  and  cherished  the  belief  that  there  was  nothing  else 
in  the  country  so  fine  as  their  forests  and  swamps,  most  of  them  were  court- 
eous, unaffected,  and  devoid  of  pretension.  They  resided  with  their  families  at 
their  country-seats  on  the  plantations,  during  the  winter  months,  and  in  the 
summer  removed  to  pleasant  mansions  along  the  Ashley  river  or  on  Sullivan's 
Island,  near  Charleston.  The  Heywards,  the  Manigaults,  the  Lowndes,  the  Mid- 
dletons,  the  Hugers,  the  Barnwells,  the  Elliotts,  the  Rhetts,  went  annually  to 
Charleston,  where  there  was  choice  and  polished  society. 

To-day,  the  majority  of  those  engaged  in  planting  at  the  outbreak  of  the  war, 
are  pitiably  poor;  and  just  at  the  close  of  the  war,  the  spectacle  of  men  who  had 
owned  two  hundred  or  five  hundred  slaves,  reduced  to  driving  a  cart  or  tending 
a  grocery,  was  quite  common.     The  enforced  poverty  of  many  is  even  bitterer 


Negro  Cabins  on   a  Rice  Plantation. 


now  than  it  was  then,  for  they  are  compelled  to  see,  day  by  day,  the  poof 
State,  which  has  already  been  so  impoverished,  plundered  anew  and  embar- 
rassed further  by  the  action  of  the  ignorant  and  vicious  legislators. 

Many  of  the  lowland  negroes  were  firmly  impressed,  when  first  called  to  use 
the  ballot,  that,  they  were  to  gain  property  by  it,  and  great  numbers  of  them  still 
have  an  idea  that  they  have  been  defrauded  of  what  they  were  entitled  to.  They 
have  also  been  told  by  so  many  legislators  of  their  own  race,  that  all  the  property 
once  their  masters'  now  properly  belongs  to  them,  that  they  literally  believe  it, 
in  many  cases,  while,  in  others,  they  consider  the  whole  thing  a  muddle  entirely 
beyond  their  comprehension. 

This  assertion  that  the  negroes  ought  to  take  the  planters'  lands  has  been 
often  made  by  white  politicians  who  gained  control  of  the  negro  at  the  time  that 


432 


THE      THEORY      OF      TAXATION      IN      SOUTH      CAROLINA, 


the  white  natives  refused  to  take  active  part  in  the  elections,  or  the  reorganization 
of  the  State.  The  whole  theory  of  taxation  in  the  commonwealth,  as  evolved  by 
Nash  and  the  few  other  colored  men  of  talent  in  the  Legislature,  is  summed  up  in 
these  words,  from  the  present  Governor's  last  message :  "  The  taxes  fall  chiefly 
where  they  belong — upon  real  estate.  The  owner  cannot  afford  to  keep 
thousands  of  acres  idle  and  unproductive,  merely  to  gratify  his  personal  vanity, 
and  because  he  inherited  them  from  his  father.  Stern  necessity,  therefore,  will 
compel  him  to  cut  up  his  ancestral  possessions  into  small  farms,  and  sell  them  to 
those  who  can  and  will  make  them  productive ;  and  thus  the  masses  of  the  people 
will  become  property  holders." 

Swart  Demos  in  the  legislative  chair,  with  artful  rogues  around  him,  remem- 
bers only  that  the  tax  was  not  raised  from  land,  but  upon  the  slaves,  previous  to 
i860;  and  when  he  thinks  of  it,  very  likely  his  blood  is  hot,  and  he  willingly 
applies  a  slashing  tax  to  the  land  owners.  "In  the  old  days,"  he  says,  "your 
cotton  acres,  worth  hundreds  of  dollars,  were  only  taxed  four  cents  an  acre,  but 
on  400,000  wretches,  such  as  I,  you  placed  a  tax  of  sixty  cents  per  head,  and 
made  us  work  it  out,  thus  getting  nearly  half  a  million  of  revenue.  Now  we  will 
make  you  work  out  your  tax,  and  we  will  wrest  your  lands  away  from  you." 
And  so  bitterness  is  needlessly  provoked  on  both  sides,  and  oppression 
flourishes.  It  is  not  taxation,  nor  even  an  increase  of  taxation,  that  the  white 
people  of  South  Carolina  object  to  ; 
but  it  is  taxation  without  repre- 
sentation, and,  unjust,  tyrannical, 
arbitrary,  overwhelming  taxation, 
producing  revenues  which  never 
get  any  further  than  the  already 
bursting  pockets  of  knaves  and 
dupes ! 

Rice  culture  has  been  the 
prominent  industry  of  South  Caro- 
lina since  the  time  of  the  Landgrave 
Thomas  Smith,  under  the  proprie- 
tary government.  With  the  deter- 
mination of  the  planters  to  make  it 
the  chief  object  of  their  care,  came 
the  necessity  for  importing  great 
numbers  of  slaves,  and  the  sacrifice 
of  many  hundreds  of  Jives,  in  the 
arduous  labors  of  clearing  the 
ground  and  preparing  the  soil. 
The  cypress  forests  gave  place  to 
the  fields  of  waving  green,  and  the  rivers  were  diverted  from  their  channels 
to  flood  the  vast  expanse  in  which  the    negroes   had    set   the  seeds. 

In  1724,  439  African  slaves  were  imported  to  South  Carolina,  together  with  a 
vast  amount  of  other  commodities,  in  exchange  for  which  the  citizens  gave  18,000 


'The  women  were  dressed  in 
gay  colors."      [Page  435.] 


"With  forty  or  fifty  pounds  of 

rice  stalks  on  their  heads." 

[Page  435.] 


OUTGROWTH     OF     CAROLINIAN     RICE     CULTURE.  433 

barrels  of  rice  and  52,000  barrels  of  naval  stores.  Year  by  year  the  importations 
of  negroes  increased  in  numbers ;  year  by  year  the  planter  became  "  more  eager 
in  the  pursuit  of  large  possessions  of  land,"  and  "  strenuously  vied  with  his  neigh- 
bor," says  a  chronicler,  "for  a  superiority  of  fortune." 

The  Carolinians  were  compelled  to  keep  up  fortifications  on  the  borders  of  the 
Spanish  domains,  to  prevent  the  negroes  from  escaping  into  foreign  territory ;  but 
they  had  few  other  external  cares.  Their  trade  grew  constantly  with  New  Eng- 
land, New  York  and  Pennsylvania;  and  in  1738,  when  there  were  fully  40,000 
negroes  in  South  Carolina,  Spanish  policy  provoked  a  formidable  insurrection  on 
the  part  of  the  blacks.  This  brought  on  open  hostilities  between  Spaniards  and 
Carolinians,  and  the  latter  made  an  unsuccessful  expedition  against  St.  Augustine. 

It  should  be  borne  in  mind  that  the  following  statistics,  showing  how  rapidly 
the  exportation  of  rice  increased  in  quantity,  also  shows  how  swiftly  the  slave 
population  of  the  province  grew.  From  1720  to  1729,  the  export  was  44,081 
tons;  from  1730  to  1740,  it  was  99,905  tons;  and  in  the  single  year  of  1740, 
90,000  barrels  were  sent  away,  the  gain  upon  which  was  estimated  at  ,£220,000. 
In  1 77 1,  the  exports  of  the  State  amounted  to  ^756,000  sterling.  Shipping 
crowded  the  harbors ;  money  was  plenty ;  the  planters  commanded  the  best  of 
everything  from  Great  Britain  and  the  West  India  Islands.  There  were  at  that 
period  no  taxes  whatever  upon  real  or  personal  estate ;  but  the  revenues  were 
raised  by  duties  on  "  spirituous  liquors,  sugar,  molasses,  flour,  biscuit,  negro 
slaves,"  etc.,  and  amounted  to  several  thousand  pounds  per  annum. 

And  so,  for  many  generations,  the  rice  culture  and  the  slave  system  went 
hand  in  hand  upon  the  fertile  Carolina  lowlands.  Good  authorities  have  assured 
me  that  they  believe  there  were  1,000,000  acres  of  rice-lafids  in  cultivation  in 
South  Carolina  at  the  outbreak  of  the  civil  war.  At  the  present  time  there  is 
hardly  one-fourth  of  that  area  cultivated,  but  there  is  a  steady  increase. 

The  blows  struck  by  immediate  emancipation  upon  this  once  gigantic  industry 
were  crushing.  Under  the  slave  regime,  the  planters  successfully  competed  with 
other  producers  in  all  the  markets  of  the  world.  From  1850  to  i860,  they 
exported  705,317,600  pounds  of  rice,  valued  at  $24,619,009.  The  total  produc- 
tion of  rice  in  the  United  States  in  1850  was  215,313,497  pounds;  even  in  i860, 
it  was  187,162,032.  Such  figures  are  eloquent.  The  rice-producing  States 
suffered  severely  at  an  early  period  of  the  war ;  the  fields  were  abandoned ;  and 
in  South  Carolina  the  production  has  decreased  from  119,100,524  pounds,  in 
i860,  to  32,304,825,  in  1870.  The  annual  product  in  Georgia,  Louisiana  and 
the  Carolinas,  from  1865  to  1871,  will  show  that  the  industry  is  gradually 
struggling  to  its  feet  once  more: 

Year.  Pounds.  Year.  Pounds. 

1866 12,002,080  1869 48,837,920' 

1867 19,368,060  1870 54,117,320 

l868 ' 27,566,740  1871 59,000,000 

Some  of  the  rice  plantations  cover  thousands  of  acres  even  now ;  and  the 
employment  of  from  five  to  eight  hundred  men,  women  and  children  by  a  single 


434 


A     RICE     PLANTATION      IN     COLLETON     COUNTY. 


A  Pair  of  Mule -Boots. 
[Page  435.] 


person,  is  not  at  all  uncommon.     I  visited  the  celebrated  plantation  at  Green 
Pond,  in  Colleton  county,  the  property  of  Mr.  Bissell,  who  has  3,500  acres  under 
his  control.     He,  in  common  with  others,  was  broken  by 
the  war,  and  is    struggling  with   the   hundred   ills  which 
beset  the  planter  in  the  changed  condition  of  affairs. 

Mr.  Bissell's  broad  fields  lie  seven  miles  from  the 
Charleston  and  Savannah  railroad,  at  the  rear  of  extensive 
pine  forests,  in  which,  now  that  the  white  man  is  so  poorly 
represented  in  the  Legislature,  the  poacher .  wanders  un- 
reproved.  The  plantation  extends  across  the  Combahee 
river  into  Beaufort  county,  and  at  various  points  rice- 
pounding  mills  and  little  villages,  in  which  the  workers  live,  are  established. 
A  morning  ride  in  the  soft,  Italian-like  autumn  across  this  or  similar  planta- 
tions, is  a  delicious  experience.  Mounted  on  a  stout  mule  or  on  a  Kentucky 
horse,  you  gallop  through  the  perfumed  avenues  of  the  forests  until  you  reach 
the  wide  expanse  of  fields,  cut  into  squares  by  long  trenches,  through  which 
water  from  the  river  in  the  background  is  admitted  to  every  part  of  the  land. 

The  breeze  rustles  musically  in  the  tall  cane  along  the  banks,  in  whose  sedgy 
recesses  the  alligator  and  the  serpent  hide.  In  the  distance  an  antlered  deer 
may  break  from  his  cover,  and  after  one  defiant  glance,  stamp  his  foot,  and  be 
gone !  A  white  sail  glides  on  the  horizon's  rim,  as  the  little  schooner  from 
Charleston  works  her  way  around  to  the  mill,  where  long  processions  of  black  boys 
and  girls,  with  baskets  on  their  heads,  and  their  mouths 
filled  with  horrible  jargon,  are  waiting  to  load  the  rice. 

The  injury  done  to  all  the  plantations  in  these  low- 
land counties,  by  the  neglect  consequent  on  the  war,  is 
incalculable.  Most  of  these  plantations  have  been  re- 
claimed from  the  waters ;  have  been  diked,  ditched, 
furnished  with  "trunks,"  by  means  of  which  the  planter 
can  inundate  or  drain  his  land  at  will.*  A  rice  plantation 
is,  in  fact,  a  huge  hydraulic  machine,  maintained  by  con- 
stant warring  against  the  rivers.  The  utmost  attention  and 
vigilance  is  necessary,  and  the  labor  must  be  ready  at  a 
moment's  notice  for  the  most  exhaustive  efforts.  Alter- 
nate flooding  and  draining  must  take  place  several  times 
during  the  season,  and  one  part  of  the  crop  must  be 
flooded,  while  the  other  adjacent  to  it  is  dry. 

Fields  are   divided  into   sections,  and  trunks  or  canals 

convey  water  from  the  river  to  each    separately.      "  The 

whole    apparatus    of    levels,    flood-gates,    trunks,    canals, 

banks,  ditches,"  says  a  prominent  planter,  "is  of  the  most 

extensive  kind,  requiring  skill  and  unity  of  purpose."     The  slightest  leak  in  the 

banks    or  dikes  may  end  in  the  ruin  of  the  whole  plantation.      Freshets,  too, 

commit  frightful  havoc  from  time  to  time.     At  one  fell  swoop  the  produce  of  a 

*  Speech  of  Hon.  F.  A.  Sawyer,  of  South  Carolina,  in  the  U.  S.  Senate,  in  1872. 


'  Trunk  -  Minder. " 
[Page  435.] 


NEGROES   ON   THE   RICE   PLANTATION. 


435 


thousand  acres  on  Mr.  Bissell's  plantation  was  swept  away  in  1872.  The  cost 
of  reclaiming  rice-lands,  and  fitting  them  for  culture,  was  about  $100  per  acre 
before  the  war,  and  so  greatly  had  they  been  damaged  by  long  neglect  that 
more  than  half  that  sum  has  been  expended  in  their  rehabilitation.  Once  well 
prepared,  the  annual  cost  of  cultivation  is  now  about  thirty  dollars  as  com- 
pared with  ten  dollars  in  former  days ;  but  it  is  steadily  decreasing. 

We  wandered  over  perhaps  700  acres,  in  Colleton  and  Beaufort  counties. 
The  men  and  women  at  work  in  the  different  sections  were  under  the  control  of 
field- masters.  The  spectacle  was  lively.  The  women  were  dressed  in  gay 
colors,  with  handkerchiefs  uniting  all  the  colors  of  the  rainbow,  around  their 
temples.  Their  feet  were  bare,  and  their  stout  limbs  encased  in  uncouth  flannel 
wrappings.  Most  of  them,  while  staggering  out  through  the  marshes  with  forty 
or  fifty  pounds  of  rice  stalks  on  their  heads,  kept  up  an  incessant  jargon  with 
one  another,  and  indulged  in  a  running  fire  of  invective  against  the  field-master. 


Unloading  the  Rice- Barges. 

The  "trunk-minders,"  the  watchmen  on  whose  vigilance  the  plantation's 
safety  depends,  promenaded  briskly ;  the  flat-boats,  on  which  the  field  hands 
deposited  their  huge  bundles  of  rice  stalks,  were  poled  up  to  the  mill,  where  the 
grain  was  threshed  and  separated  from  the  straw,  winnowed,  and  carried  in 
baskets  to  the  schooners  which  transported  it  to  Charleston,  and  the  "  pounding- 
mills."     During  harvest- time  800  hands  are  employed  on  this  plantation. 

Harvest  is  hardly  completed  by  March,  when  the  sowing  begins  again.  The 
trunks  are  opened  in  each  section  the  day  it  is  planted,  and  the  fields  are  flooded. 
The  mules,  that  annually  drag  the  ploughs  through  the  marshes,  are  booted  with 
leather  contrivances,  to  prevent  them  from  sinking  into  the  treacherous  ooze. 
To  the  negroes  is  given  the  rice  that  grows  along  the  margins,  and  consider- 
able profit  is  obtained  from  its  sale.  The  fields  in  autumn  are  yellowish  in 
hue,  tinged  here  and  there  lightly  with  green,  where  young  rice  is  upspringing 


436  PHASES      OF      LOWLAND      LIFE. 

from  the  shoots  recently  cut  down.  The  rice  lies  in  ricks,  but  is  ill  protected, 
swarms  of  birds  carrying  away  great  quantities. 

While  we  were  strolling  afield,  one  stout  negro  came  up  and  asked  "  Mas'r 
Ben"  to  buy  him  a  mule  with  $100  which  he  had  saved.  "  Mas'r  Ben"  agreed 
to  do  it,  and  informed  me  that  such  a  purchase  was  a  sign  of  a  negro's  assured 
prosperity.  The  wages  paid  the  rice-field  hands  ranged  from  twenty-five  cents 
to  one  dollar  and  seventy-five  cents  daily,  but  the  manager  on  this,  as  on  many 
other  plantations,  found  great  difficulty  in  keeping  the  labor  organized  and  avail- 
able. The  men  found  that  by  two  or  three  days'  work  they  could  procure 
money  enough  to  support  them  in  idleness  the  next  week,  and  sometimes  the 
overseers  were  at  a  loss  what  to  do  for  help. 

Beautiful  were  the  broad  and  carefully  cultivated  acres,  stretching  miles  away 
on  either  side  of  the  placid,  deep,  and  noble  Combahee  ;  picturesque  were  the 
granaries,  almost  bursting  with-  the  accumulated  stores  of  the  precious  grain ; 
and  novel  and  inspiring  the  vistas  of  the  long  sedge-bordered  canals,  through 
which  the  morning  breezes  lightly  whistled.  The  sea-myrtle  was  neighbor  to 
the  cane,  and  the  tall  grasses  twined  lovingly  around  them  both. 

At  the  "  store,"  about  whose  entrance  were  grouped  packs  of  hounds,  leap- 
ing and  fawning  about  their  masters,  Avho  were  mounting  their  horses,  we  saw 
crowds  of  negresses,  barefooted  and  barelimbed,  bringing  poultry  or  eggs  to 
exchange  for  corn,  or  chattering  frantically,  or  bursting  into  boisterous  laughter 
which  echoed  over  many  a  broad  acre. 

One  could  not  help  thinking  that  in  due  time  a  vast  amount  of  labor-saving 
machinery  must  come  to  take  the  place  of  this  rude  and  careless  negro  element 
upon  the  rice  plantation.  At  present,  the  planters  admit,  there  is  an  enor- 
mous waste,  and  the  climate's  character  renders  it  impossible  to  introduce  white 
labor  and  intelligence  into  the  section.  The  negro  men  and  women  whom  I 
saw  were  certainly  of  a  low  and  degraded  type,  distinctively, — as  a  Frenchman, 

with  his  quick  instincts,  said  on  seeing  a  group  of 
-^%^^S[T'i^^^^0M^M-         these    same    lowland    people, —  "a    broken    down 

race !" 

At  the  threshing -mill,  at  the  winnowing -ma- 
chine, among  the  great  rice  stacks  where  they  were 
packing  and  sorting  and  unloading  from  barges, 
the  women  were  coarse,  brutish,  and  densely  igno- 
rant; the  men,  in  the  main,  the  same.  There 
were  types  of  face  in  which  the  savage  still  stood 
out  in  splendor.  Many  women  of  sixty  or  seventy 
years  of  age  were  at  work  in  various  places  about 
the  field.  They  had  evidently  been  untouched 
••At  the  winnowing- machine."  by  the  Sp£rit  of  the   war.      I  doubt    if  they   re- 

alized the  change  in  their  condition.  Their  conversation  with  me  was  confined 
to  inquiries  as  to  how  much  tobacco  I  would  give  them,  and  an  appeal  to  me  to 
tell  Mas'r  Ben  that  they  "  bin  want "  a  new  handkerchief,  and  hoped  he  would 
not  forget  them.     The  men    as   a    rule   were  civil,  but   a   little    suspicious   in 


THE      LABOR     QUESTION      IN      LOWLAND      SOUTH      CAROLINA. 


437 


demeanor,  as  if  they  did  not  intend  to  allow  any  advantage  to  be  taken  of 
them.  If  looked  at  sharply,  they  would  wince,  and  finally,  wreathing  their  lips 
with  broad  grins,  would  bow  and  shuffle  away. 

The  planters  throughout  this  section,  where  the  Middletons  and  the  Hey- 
wards  once  tilled  so  many  acres,  and  whence  they  drew  great  incomes,  admit 
that  the  labor  question  is  the  most  serious  one  with  them.  The  profits  of  rice- 
planting  are  enormous,  but  the  system  of  large  plantations  will,  perhaps,  have 
to  be  adhered  to,  and  African  or  Chinese  labor  can  alone  sustain  the  trials  of  the 
summer  climate.  The  production  of  the  State,  and  the  adjacent  lowlands  in 
other  States,  will  doubtless  again  reach  the  figure  attained  before  the  war, 
although  the  present  condition  of  South  Carolina  would  not  seem  to  justify 
prophecies  of  any  prosperity  within  her  limits,  save  in  Charleston. 


Aunt  Bransom." — A  venerable  ex-slave  on  a  South 
Carolina  Rice  Plantation. 


XLIX. 


CHARLESTON,   SOUTH   CAROLINA. 


AND  why  prosperity  in  Charleston  ?  Mainly  because  the  venerable  city  has 
established  in  addition  to  her  important  cotton  trade,  a  large  number 
of  manufacturing  enterprises,  for  which  her  location  is  particularly  advantageous; 
and  because  her  business  men  have  an  elastic  spirit  and  a  remarkable  courage, 
which  reflect  the  highest  credit  upon  them.  A  veritable  phoenix,  always  spring- 
ing triumphantly  from  the  ashes  of  terrible  conflagrations,  as  well  as  from  the 
ruins  caused  by  hurricanes  and  bombardments,  the  South  Carolinian  metropolis 
is,  in  itself,  a  standing  reproof  to  the  too  oft-repeated  assertion  that  the  ancient 
commonwealth  lacks  enterprise. 

When  the  war  closed  there  was  not  a  completed  railroad  ending  in  Charles- 
ton.    Those    now   known    as    the    North-eastern,    giving    connection   with    the 


View  from  Fort  Sumter,  in  Charleston  Harbor.     [Page  440.] 

route  to  Wilmington;  the  South  Carolina,  running  north-westward  to  Columbia, 
Aiken,  and  Augusta;  and  the  Savannah  and  Charleston,  penetrating  the  lowlands 
and  reaching  to  the  Georgian  seaport,  were  worn  down  and  almost  completely 
wrecked.  Costly  bridges  and  trestles  had  been  destroyed,  depots  burned,  tracks 
torn  up,  and  the  amount  of  rolling-stock  was  absurdly  inadequate  to  immediate 
wants.  The  rebuilding  and  equipment  were  begun  in  1866.  All  the  old  rail 
connections  are  now  resuscitated,  and  Charleston  is  reaching  out  for  a  wider 
range  of  commerce  than,  before  the  war,  she  would  have  deemed  possible.  The 
South  Carolina  railroad  and  its  feeders,  the  Greenville  and  Columbia,  and  the 
Macon  and  Augusta,  in  Georgia,  send  vast  quantities  of  freight,  which  heretofore 
went  northward,  to  the  Carolinian  metropolis.     The  North-eastern,  and  the  Savan- 


THE   TRADE.  OF   CHARLESTON.  439 

nah  and  Charleston,  are  important  links  in  the  shortest  route  from  New  York  to 
Florida,  and  with  the  sea-board  line,  from  New  York  to  New  Orleans.  Many 
steamship  companies  were  compelled  to  suspend  communication  with  the  city 
during  the  war;  now  there  are  two  steamer  lines  between  New  York  and 
Charleston,  comprising  eight  fine  steamers,  capable  of  carrying  away  30,000 
bales  of  cotton  monthly.  On  the  Baltimore  line  there  are  three  steamers,  on 
the  Philadelphia  two,  on  the  Boston  two,  with  a  carrying  capacity  altogether  of 
about  14,000  bales  monthly.  The  splendid  line  to  Florida  has  been  reopened, 
and  the  connections  with  Savannah,  Beaufort,  Georgetown,  Edisto,  and  the 
Peedee  river  are  also  resumed,  and  are  very  prosperous. 

The  increase  in  steamship  freights  from  Charleston  since  i860  has  been  300 
per  cent.,  but  the  sail  tonnage  is  not  larger  than  it  was  in  1862,  as  much  of  its 
trade  has  been  transferred  to  steamers.  The  following  receipts  of  cotton  at 
Charleston  for  eight  years  since  the  war  also  indicate  a  marked  prosperity  : 

Years.*  Bales  of  Cotton.  Years.  Rales  of  Cotton. 

1865-66 111,714  1869-70 250,761 

1866-67.  .'. 165,316  1870-71 356,544 

1867-68 246,018  1871-72     282,686 

1868-69 200,764  1872-73 385,000 

A  large  proportion  of  this  cotton  was  sent  to  Charleston  for  sale,  not  merely 
to  pass  through.  The  exports  of  rice  from  Charleston,  from  September,  1865,  to 
September,  1873,  amount  to  about  250,000  tierces.  The  increase  in  the  number  of 
naval  stores  reported  has  also  been  remarkable,  as  shown  by  the  following  table  : 

Years.  Barrels.  Years.  Barrels. 

1865-66 32,136                  1869-70 79,156 

1866-67.  •  •  •  • 54,026         \         1870-71 90,297 

1867-68 62,852                  [871-72 151,553 

1868-69 72,279                  1872-73 225,683 

The  lumber  exports  since  the  war  have  also  been  large,  footing  up  at  least 
140,000,000  of  feet.  The  rich  pine  forests  of  the  State  are  annually  of  increasing 
importance.  Charleston,  Beaufort  and  Georgetown  are  all  daily  receiving  great 
stores  of  lumber  from  the  forests,  which  still  stretch  over  thousands  of  acres. 
The  swamps  furnish  the  best  of  material  for  ship-building,  and  Charleston  has 
built  many  fine  lumber-mills  in  which  to  prepare  the  pine  and  other  useful  trees 
for  shipping.  The  city  sadly  needs  the  addition  of  several  millions  to  its  banking 
capital  to  enable  it  to  carry  out  its  schemes.  The  three  National  and  four  State 
banks  now  have  hardly  $3,000,000  of  paid  up  capital.  There  are  four  savings 
banks,  with  a  little  more  than  $  1 ,000,000,  much  of  which  represents  the  savings 
of  the  freedmen,  on  deposit.  Private  bankers  are  also  doing  a  good  deal  for  the 
city's  interests. 

Very  lovely  is  the  old  city,  lying  confidingly  on  the  waters,  at  the  confluence 
of  the  broad  Ashley  and  Cooper  rivers,  and  fronting  on  the  spacious  harbor,  over 
whose  entrance  the  scarred  and  ever  memorable  Sumter  keeps  watch  and  ward. 
*  The  commercial  year  begins  September  1. 


440 


CHARLESTON  .  IN      OLD     TIMES ITS      APPROACHES. 


Nature  has  lavished  a  wealth  of  delicious  foliage  upon  all  the  surroundings  of  the 
city,  and  the  palmetto,  the  live  and  water  oaks,  the  royal  magnolias,  the  tall 
pines,  the  flourishing  hedges,  and  the  gardens  filled  with  rich,  tropical  blooms, 
profoundly  impress  the  stranger.  The  winter  climate  is  superb,  and  the  sunshine 
seems  omnipresent,  creeping  into  even  the  narrowest  lanes  and  by-ways. 

In  1680,  the  people  who  had  been  encouraged  to  remove  from  the  badly 
chosen  site  of  a  settlement  which  they  had  selected  on  the  banks  of  the  Ashley 
river  in  1671,  laid  the  foundations  at  Charleston,  and  the  town  at  once  sprang 
into  activity.  It  began  its  commerce  in  dangerous  times,  for  pirates  hovered 
about  the  mouth  of  the  Ashley,  and  many  a  good  ship,  laden  with  the  produce 
of  the  plantations,  and  bound  for  Great  Britain,  was  plundered,  and  its  crew  set 
on  shore,  or  murdered,  if  resistance  was  offered.  A  hurricane  also  swept  over 
the  infant  town,  half  ruining  it ;  and  then  began  a  series  of  destructive  fires, 
which,  from  1680  to  1862,  have,  at  fearfully  short  intervals,  carried  havoc  and 
destruction  into  the  homes  of  the  wealthiest. 

In  later  years,  too,  the  fleets  of  hostile  Spaniards  or  Frenchmep  sometimes 
brought  panic  even  to  Charleston  bar;  and  the  beacon  fires  on  Sullivan's  Island, 
in  the  harbor,  warned  the  citizens  to  be  on  their  guard.  In  1728,  a  hurricane 
created  an  inundation,  which  overflowed  the  town  and  lowlands,  forced  the 
inhabitants  to  take  refuge  on  the  roofs  of  their  dwellings,  drove  twenty- three  fine 
ships  ashore,  and  leveled  many  thousands  of  trees.  In  the  same  year  came  the 
yellow  fever,  sweeping  off  multitudes  of  whites  and  blacks.  After  the  surrender, 
by  the  proprietary  government,  of  its  control  of  the  province,  into  the  hands  of 
the  sovereign  of  Great  Britain,  on  the  payment  of  a  round  sum  of  purchase 
money,  Charleston  became  more  prosperous  than  ever  before.      In   1765   it  was 

described  as  "  one  of  the  first  cities  in 
British  America,  yearly  advancing  in 
size,  riches  and  population." 

The  approaches  to  Charleston  from 
the  sea  are  unique,  and  the  stranger 
yields  readily  to  the  illusion  that  the 
city  springs  directly  from  the  bosom 
of  the  waves.  The  bar  at  the  harbor's 
mouth  will  allow  ships  drawing  seven- 
teen feet  of  water  to  pass  over  it. 
The  entrance  from  the  sea  is  com- 
manded on  either  side  by  Morris  and 
Sullivan's  Islands,  the  former  the  scene 
of  terrific  slaughter  during  the  dread- 
ful days  of  1863,  and  subsequently  one 
of  the  points  from  which  the  Union 
forces  bombarded  Charleston ;  and  the  latter  at  present  a  fashionable  summer 
resort,  crowded  with  fine  mansions.  On  the  harbor  side  of  Sullivan's  Island,  Fort 
Moultrie,  a  solid  and  well-constructed  fortification,  frowns  over  the  hurrying 
waters.     Passing  Sumter,  which  lies  isolated  and  in  semi-ruin,  looking,  at  a  dis- 


The  old  Charleston  Post-office.      [Page  441.] 


THE      HARBOR      QUARTER THE      OLD      POST-OFFICE. 


441 


tance,  like  some  coral  island  pushed  up  from  the  depths,  one  sails  by  pleasant 
shores  lined  with  palmettoes  and  grand  moss-hung  oaks,  and  by  Castle  Pinckney, 
and  anchors  at  the  substantial  wharves  of  the  proud  little  city. 

Many  ships  from  many  climes  are  anchored  at  these  wharves,  and  the  town 
seems  the  seaport  of  some  thriving  commercial  State,  so  little  does  it  represent 
the  actual  condition  of  South  Carolina.  The  graceful  Corinthian  portico  and 
columns  of  the  new  Custom- House,  built  of  pure  white  marble,  rise  up  near  the 
water-side.  There  is  a  jolly  refrain  of  the  clinking  of  hammers,  the  rattling  of 
drays,  and  the  clanking  of  chains,  which  indicates  much  activity.  Here  some 
foreign  vessel,  which  has  come  for  phosphates,  is  unloading  her  ballast ;  here  a 
rice-schooner  is  unloading  near  a  pounding- mill.  On  one  hand  are  lumber- 
yards ;  on  another,  cotton-sheds,  filled  with  bales.    Hundreds  of  negroes,  scream- 


Houses  on  the  Battery — Charleston. 

ing  and  pounding  their  mules,  clatter  along  the  piers  and  roadways;  a  great 
Florida  steamer  is  swinging  round,  and  starting  on  her  ocean  trip  to  the  Penin- 
sula, with  her  decks  crowded  with  Northern  visitors.  Along  "  East  Bay  "  the 
houses  are,  in  many  places,  solid  and  antique.  The  whole  aspect  of  the  harbor 
quarter  is  unlike  that  of  any  of  our  new  and  smartly  painted  Northern  towns. 
In  Charleston  the  houses  and  streets  have  an  air  of  dignified  repose  and  solidity. 
At  the  foot  of  Broad  street,  a  spacious  avenue  lined  with  banks  and  offices  of 
professional  men,  stands  the  old  "  Post-office,"  a  building  of  the  colonial  type, 
much  injured  during  the  late  war,  but  since  renovated  at  considerable  expense. 
Most  of  the  original  material  for  the  construction  of  the  edifice  was  brought  from 
England  in  1761.  Within  its  walls  the  voices  of  Rutledge,  Pinckney,  Gadsden, 
Lowndes  and   Laurens  were    raised  to  vehemently  denounce  the  Government 


442 


CHARLESTON      MANSIONS  —  KING      STREET. 


A  Charleston   Mansion. 


against  whose  tyranny  the  "  Thirteen  original  States  "  rebelled  ;  from  the  old 
steps  Washington  addressed  the  Charlestonians  in  1791  ;  and  for  many  years 
during  this  century  it  was  an  Exchange  for  the  merchants  of  Charleston  and 
vicinity.     When  the  British  occupied  Charleston,  the  building  was  the   scene  of 

many  exciting  episodes. 
The  basement  was  taken 
for  a  prison,  and  all  who 
were  devoted  to  the 
cause  of  American  lib- 
erty were  confined  there- 
in. From  that  prison 
the  martyr,  Isaac  Hayne, 
was  led  to  execution ;  and 
in  the  cellar  one  hundred 
thousand  pounds  of 
powder  lay  safely  hidden 
from  the  British  during 
the  whole  time  of  their 
occupation.  On  the  site 
of  this  building  stood 
the  old  council -chamber 
and    watch-house    used    in  the -days  of  the    "proprietary  government." 

The  original  plan  of  Charleston  comprised  a  great  number  of  streets  running 
at  right  angles,  north  and  south,  east  and  west,  between  the  two  rivers.  But 
many  of  these  streets  were  very  narrow,  being,  in  fact,  nothing  more  than  lanes ; 
and  they  have  remained  unchanged  until  the  present  day.  The  darkness  and 
narrowness  of  the  old  lanes,  the  elder  colonists  thought,  would  keep  away  the 
glare  of  the  bright  sun ;  but  the  modern  Charlestonians  do  not  seem  of  their  opin- 
ion, for  they  open  wide  avenues,  and  court  the  sun  freely  in  their  spacious  and 
elegant  mansions  on  the  "Battery."  Some  of  the  Charleston  avenues  present  a 
novel  appearance,  bordered  as  they  are  on  either  side  by  tall,  weather-stained 
mansions,  whose  gable-ends  front  upon  the  sidewalks,  and  which  boast  verandas 
attached  to  each  story,  screened  from  the  sun  and  from  observation  by  ample 
wooden  lattices,  and  by  trellised  vines  and  creepers.  The  high  walls,  which  one 
sees  so  often  in  France  and  England,  surround  the  majority  of  the  gardens,  and 
it  is  only  through  the  gate,  as  in  New  Orleans,  that  one  can  catch  a  glimpse  of 
the  loveliness  within.  In  some  of  the  streets  remote  from  the  harbor  front,  the 
stillness  of  death  or  desertion  reigns;  many  of  the  better  class  of  mansions  are 
vacant,  and  here  and  there  the  residence  of  some  former  aristocrat  is  now  serving 
as  an  abode  for  a  dozen  negro  families. 

On  King  street  one  sees  the  most  activity  in  the  lighter  branches  of  trade ; 
there  the  ladies  indulge  in  shopping,  evening,  morning,  and  afternoon ;  there  is 
located  the  principal  theatre,  the  tasty,  little  "Academy  of  Music,"  and  there  also, 
are  some  elegant  homes.  Along  that  section  of  King  street,  near  the  crossing  of 
Broad,  however,  are  numerous  little  shops  frequented  by  negroes,  in  which  one 


NEAR      THE      ASHLEY      RIVER MARKS      OF      THE      FIRE. 


443 


sees  the  most  extravagant  array  of  gaudy  but  inexpensive  articles  of  apparel; 
and  of  eatables  which  the  negro  palate  cannot  resist.  The  residence  streets  of 
the  "Palmetto  City,"  on  the  side  next  the  Ashley  river,  are  picturesque  and  lovely. 
They  are  usually  bordered  by  many  beautiful  gardens.  A  labyrinth  of  long 
wooden  piers  and  wharves  runs  out  on  the  lagoons  and  inlets  near  the  Ashley, 
and  the  boasted  resemblance  of  Charleston  to  Venice  is  doubtless  founded  on 
the  perfect  illusion  produced  by  a  view  of  that  section  from  a  distance.  The 
magnificent  and  the  mean  jostle  each  other  very  closely  in  all  quarters. 


The  Spire  of  St.  Philip's  Church — Charleston. 

The  stranger  visiting  Charleston  is  surprised  to  find  that  little  has  been  done 
toward  rebuilding  that  portion  of  the  city  swept  away  by  fire  in  1861.  There 
are  still  gaps  left  in  the  heart  of  the  populous  sections;  one  suddenly  comes 
upon  the  scarred  and  scorched  walls  of  a  huge  church,  or  the  foundations 
of  some  immense  block,  in  a  location  which  it  seems  folly  to  leave  unim- 
proved. But  the  Charlestonians  explain  that  they  do  not  need  to  rebuild  as  yet, 
for  though  the  population  is  gradually  increasing  (it  is  now  more  than  fifty 
thousand)  the  altered  circumstances  of  some  classes  in  society  have  compelled 
them  to  retire  and  make  room  for  others. 


THE    VENICE    OF    AMERICA — CHARLESTON'S     POLITICS. 
A     LOVELY     LOWLAND     CITY  —  I  IMMIGRATION. 

IF  we  climb  into  the  tower  of  the  stately  building  known  as  the  "  Orphan 
House,"  some  pleasant  evening,  when  the  sunset  is  beginning  to  throw 
the  dark  walls  and  picturesque  groupings  of  the  sea-girdled  city  into  strong 
relief,  we  can  get  a  panoramic  glimpse  of  all  the  chief  features  of  Charleston's 


The  Orphan  House  —  Charleston. 

exterior.  We  shall,  perhaps,  be  too  far  from  the  Battery  and  its  adjacent  parks 
to  note  fully  the  effect  of  the  gay  group  promenading  the  stone  parapet  against 
which  the  tides  break  gently,  or  to  catch  the  perfect  beauty  of  the  palm-girt 
shores  so  distinctly  visible  beyond  the  Ashley's  current,  now  that  the  sunset  has 
given  them  a  blood- red  background.  The  Battery  is  not  crowded  with  carriages, 
as  in  those  merry  days  when  the  State  was  still  prosperous,  or  on  that  famous 
day  when  yonder  black  mass  in  the  harbor  was  aflame,  and  when  the  flag  of  the 
nation  which  floated  over  it  was  hauled  down.  But  it  is  one  of  the  airiest  and 
most  elegant  promenades  possessed  by  any  Southern  city,  and  the  streets  leading 
to  it  are  quaint  and  beautiful.  The  church  spires  here  and  there  are  noticeable, 
and  that  one  glistening  in  the  distance  was  a  white  mark  for  many  a  day  for  the 
Federal  batteries ;  yet  few  shells  struck  the  stately  steeple  of  St.  Michael's,  the 
old-fashioned,  staid  Episcopal  house  of  prayer. 


BIRD'S-EYE      VIEW      OF     CHARLESTON. 


445 


Beyond   this   church   one   sees   a   mass   of  buildings,  whose  queer  roofs  and 
strangely  shapen  chimneys  remind  him  of  Antwerp  or  of  Amsterdam.    These  date 
from  colonial  times;  it  is  the  Charleston  of  pre-revolutionary  days  which  one  sees 
clustered  around  St.    Michael's.     The  bells  were  removed  during  the  siege  of 
Charleston  to  Columbia;  were  captured  and  accidentally  cracked;  were  recovered, 
sent  to  England,  and  recast  in  the  foundry  in  Whitechapel,  from  whence  they  were 
originally   obtained.      After  the  war  they  were  put  back  in  their  place  in  the 
steeple  with  great  rejoicing  amongst  the  old  Charlestonians.     Yonder,  nearer  the 
harbor,  out  of  Church  street,  arises  another  spire,  the  counterpart  of  St.  Martin's 
in  the  Fields  in  London.      It  is  the  tower  of  St.  Philip's,  also  an  Episcopal  church, 
and  in  the  old  graveyard  opposite  is  a  simple  tomb  in  which  repose  the  bones  of 
John  C.  Calhoun.     The  statesman   rests  in  an  antiquated,  yet  beautiful  corner  of 
the  town.     The  venerable  cemetery  is  embowered  in  trees,  and  hemmed  round 
about  by  old  buildings  with  tiled  roofs.      The  remains  were  removed  when  the 
Union  forces  seemed  likely  to  capture  Charleston,  but  were  replaced  in   1871. 
The  formidable  ruin,  which  the  sunset-glow  throws  so  sharply  upon  your  vision, 
is  the  old  cathedral  of  St.  John  and  St.  Finbar,  destroyed  in  the  last  great  fire. 
On  its  site,  when  the  Charlestonians  were  compelled  to  surrender  to  the  British, 
occurred   a  tremendous   explosion,   occasioned   by  the   rage  of  the  conquered. 


The  Battery  — Charleston. 

They  were  compelled  to  deposit  their  arms  at  the  arsenal,  which  was  also  a  pow- 
der magazine,  and  all  coming  at  once,  and  hurling  down  upon  the  ground  hun- 
dreds of  fire-arms,  an  explosion  took  place,  igniting  twenty  thousand  pounds  of 
powder  and  blowing  to  atoms  the  adjacent  Lunatic  Asylum,  Poor- House,  Guard- 
29 


446  ARCHITECTURE POLITICS. 

House,  and  Barracks,  as  well  as  conquerors  and  conquered.  The  city  has  many 
other  interesting  churches,  among  them  the  Huguenot,  which  has  on  its  walls, 
numerous  interesting  ancient  inscriptions.  Grace  Church  (Episcopal)  is  the 
resort  of  the  fashionable  worshipers. 

There  is  nothing  remarkable  in  the  secular  architecture  of  Charleston;  yet 
this  old  Orphan  House,  from  whose  tower  we  survey  the  others,  with  its  lovely 


The  Grave  of  John  C  Calhoun  —  Charleston.     [Page  445. J 

garden  hedged  in  from  the  street,  with  its  statue  of  William  Pitt,  which  the  grate- 
ful citizens  erected  when  the  "stamp  act"  was  repealed,  is  imposing.  It  was 
founded  in  1790,  is  bountifully  endowed,  ahd  thousands  of  orphan  boys  and  girls 
have  been  well  cared  for  within  its  walls.  John  C.  Fremont  and  the  Carolinian 
Memminger  were  educated  there.  There  is  an  institution  of  the  same  class 
for  the  colored  people.  Neither  the  hotels  nor  the  banks  are  distinguished  for 
architectural  excellence.  The  Charleston  Hotel  has  an  immense  stone- pillared 
piazza  fronting  on  Meeting  street,  but  the  Mills  House  and  the  Pavilion  are 
simply  solid  blocks. 

The  Charleston  Club-House  is  an  elegant  structure,  and  the  building  of  the 
South  Carolina  Hall  is  fine  in  interior  arrangement.  The  Club- House  has  become 
the  seat  of  the  Federal  courts,  and  white  and  black  men  sit  together  in  juries 
there.  The  Court-House  and  the  City  Hall  are  substantial  edifices,  fronting  each, 
other  on  corners  of  Broad  and  Meeting  streets.  Around  them  are  always  loung- 
ing crowds  of  negro  men  and  women,  as  if  they  delighted  to  linger  in  the  atmos- 
phere of  government  and  law,  to  the  powers  and  responsibilities  of  which  they 
have  lately  been  introduced.  At  the  Guard- House  one  may  note  white  and 
black  policemen  on  terms  of  amity. 

Charleston  prospers  despite  the  anomalous  condition  of  politics  and  society  in 
the  State.  What  might  she  not  become  if  the  commonwealth  were  developed  to 
its  utmost  ?  The  citizens  suffer  many  trying  ills,  the  most  aggravated  of  which 
is  the  small  role  that  the  present  leaders  of  the  majority  permit  them  to  play  in 
State  politics.  The  Legislature  has  out-Napoleoned  Napoleon  III.  in  measures  for 
the  corruption  of  suffrage,  and  has  enacted  an  infamous  law,  which  allows  Gov- 
ernors of  the  State  to  control  the  ballot-box  completely  through  commissioners 


ELECTIONS      IN     CHARLESTON. 


447 


appointed  virtually  by  himself.  Its  vote  is  swallowed  up  in  the  vote  of  Charles- 
ton county,  and  consequently  it  is  represented  only  at  second-hand  in  the  State 
Assembly,  getting  but  a  meagre  and  partial  hearing  through  a  score  of  ignorant 
negroes,  sent  from  the  plantations  and  small  towns  in  the  vicinity. 

The  first  election  in  Charleston  after  reconstruction  was  held  in  1868,  and  the 
Republican  candidate  for  Mayor,  Pillsbury,  was  elected  by  a  majority  of  twenty- 
three  in  a  poll  of  10,000.  He  remained  in  office  until  the  summer  of  1871,  when 
the  Conservatives  attempted  a  fusion,  and  ran  a  ticket  composed  of  white  and  black 
candidates,  against  the  Republicans,  with  John  A.  Wagener,  a  German,  for  Mayor, 
and  elected  him  by  J77  majority.  This  administration  had  continued  to  the  date 
of  my  visit,  in  1873,  when  a  new  election  took  place,  and  exhibited  in  the  most 
glaring  light  some  of  the  atrocities  of  the  present  system.  The  Conservatives 
alleged,  and  it  was,  indeed,  clearly  proven,  that  four  hundred  negroes  were  imported 
from  Edisto  Island  at  one  time,  to  create  a  majority  in  Charleston  for  the  so-called 
"Republicans."  None  but  Radical  supervisors  of  the  elections  were  appointed, 
and  the  right  of  challenge  at  every  poll-precinct  was  denied.  The  law  required 
every  person  voting  to  swear  that  he  was  a  citizen  of  Charleston,  but  the  imported 
voters  were  provided  with  the  printed  forms  of  the  oath,  from  which  the  clause 
concerning  the  place  of  residence  was  omitted. 

With  no  power  of  interference,  and  no  chance  to  dispute  at  the  polls  or  in  the 
counting  of  the  votes,  this  city  of  50,000  inhabitants,  possessing  $30,000,000 
worth  of  taxable  property,  was  delivered  over,  bound  hand  and  foot,  to  the  tender 


The  Ruins  of  St   Finbar  Cathedral  —  Charleston.      [Page  445.] 

mercies  of  the  ignorant  and  the  vicious.  The  party  then  in  power  admitted  the 
abnormal  condition  of  affairs.  Governor  Moses  told  an  editor  in  Charleston  that 
every  citizen  of  South  Carolina  could  vote  in  that  city,  if  he  chose,  without 
hindrance ;  the  Charlestonians  could  not  help  themselves. 


448  TRICKERY     BY     NEGROES      AND      CARPET-BAGGERS. 

The  result  of  this  latter  election,  in  which  the  negro  party  was,  of  course,  vic- 
torious, was  a  ferment,  culminating  in  mass-meetings,  investigations,  and  finally 
in  a  series  of  arguments.  It  was  charged  and  shown  that  the  commissioners  for 
the  elections  did  not  designate  all  the  polling- places  so  that  the  general  public 
would  know  where  they  were,  but  that  they  stealthily  opened  them  during  the 
election,  and  there  "  rushed  through  "  the  illegal  voters.  It  was  also  affirmed 
by  the  supporters  of  the  corrupt  State  Government  that  a  "residence  in  the  city 
without  limit  as  to  time,"  in  the  county,  sixty  days,  and  in  the  State,  one  year, 
were  qualifications  sufficient  for  a  voter  under  the  act  of  1873.  The  board  of 
managers  consisted,  at  the  city  election  in  1873,  almost  entirely  of  negroes. 
Several  hundred  special  deputy  sheriffs  were  appointed  to  "  maintain  order  "  if 
the  Conservatives  made  any  attempt  to  challenge  voters  at  the  polls ;  and  the 
managers  refused  to  give  the  reporters  of  the  city  press  any  information  concern- 
ing the  changes  made  in  the  polling-places  the  night  before  the  election.  The 
Republican  or  Radical  ticket  was  elected,  and  the  protest  of  the  citizens  of 
Charleston  having  been  entered,  the  "  board  of  commissioners,"  appointed  by  the 
Legislature,  then  published  a  formal  announcement  that  the  election  was  "  legal 
and  valid,"  and  that  the  "protest  was  overruled." 

The  Conservatives  were  bitterly  grieved  at  this,  as  they  had  made  a  very  firm 
stand,  and  it  showed  them  how  completely  they  were  at  the  mercy  of  their 
present  masters.  They  were  not  especially  dissatisfied  with  the  choice  for  Mayor, 
as  the  successful  candidate,  Mr.  Cunningham,  is  an  honest  man ;  but  the  other 
municipal  officers  elected  they  regarded  quite  differently.  The  present  police 
force  of  the  city  is  about  equally  divided  into  black  and  white,  and  there  are  nine 
colored  aldermen  in  the  new  board.  It  is  not  because  of  the  presence  of  the 
negro  in  these  offices  of  trust  and  honor  that  the  Charlestonians  are  angry  and 
grieved,  but  because  he  refuses  them  their  proper  share  in  the  government. 
As  they  are  now  situated,  the  intelligence  and  property  of  the  city  are  as 
completely  shut  out  from  political  representation  as  if  they  were  imprisoned 
within  walls  of  adamant. 

Charleston's  city  tax,  in  1872,  amounted  to  two  per  cent,  but  in  1873  was 
somewhat  reduced.  The  combined  city,  county,  and  State  tax,  however,  now 
amounts  to  three  and  a-half  per  cent.  The  assessments  are  always  fully  up  to, 
and  usually  over,  the  actual  value  of  property.  The  property  holder,  in  the  first 
instance,  makes  his  returns.  If  the  county  auditor  is  not  satisfied  with  the  esti- 
mates, he  changes  them  to  suit  himself;  and  the  citizen  then  has  the  refuge  of 
appeal  to  a  "board  of  equalization."  The  Constitution  requires  that  all  property 
be  taxed  at  its  value. 

The  present  city  debt  is  nearly  $5,000,000,  some  of  which  was  incurred  by 
subscriptions  to  railroads  before  the  war.  The  city,  before  the  war,  invested 
$1,000,000  in  the  Blue  Ridge  railroad,  and  the  State  about  $1,300,000.  In 
1868  or  '69,  the  State  stock,  a  majority,  was  sold  for  $13,000,  to  a  ring.  Shortly 
before  this  the  State  had  guaranteed  $4,000,000  of  bonds  of  the  road ;  these  were 
hypothecated  by  the  company.  The  ring  secured  the  passage  of  a  law  authoriz- 
ing the  State  Treasurer  to  issue   $1,800,000  of  revenue  bond  scrip  upon  the 


LICENSES THE      CHICAGO      AND      CHARLESTON      RAIL      ROUTE. 


449 


surrender  to  him  of  the  $4,000,000  guaranteed  bonds,  said  scrip  receivable  for 
taxes.  Exchange  was  made,  and  bonds  have  been  canceled,  but  the  State 
Supreme  Court  has  decided  that  the  act  authorizing  the  issue  of  the  scrip  is 
unconstitutional  and  void.  The  "  licenses  "  which  business  and  professions  are 
already  compelled  to  submit  to  are 
grievous  burdens,  and  the  people  con- 
sider them  such  an  odious  form  of 
municipal  taxation  that  when  the 
Legislature  passed  a  law  for  collect- 
ing State  licenses  also,  it  was  resisted, 
and  finally  its  repeal  was  deemed 
expedient.  The  astute  legislators  even 
imposed  a  license -tax  upon  the  rail- 
roads, which  were,  of  course,  already 
licensed  by  charter. 

Thus  cut  off,  politically,  Charles- 
ton, with  grim  patience,  awaits  a  turn 
in  the  tide  of  affairs,  and  catches  a 
little  inspiration  from  the  development 
of  the  scheme  for  a  new  railway  route 
from  Chicago  to  Charleston.  This 
superb  air  line,  when  built,  will 
pass  by  Columbia  and  Spartan- 
burg, in  South  Carolina,  northward 
to  Asheville,  in  the  North  Carolina 
mountains — thence  through  Cumber- 
land Gap  into  Lexington,  in  Kentucky,  and  so  onward  to  Chicago,  giving  an 
outlet  on  the  sea  100  miles  nearer  the  North-west  than  New  York  now  is  by 
any  existing  line.  The  towns  mentioned  above  are  situated  directly  on  the  route 
originally  projected  for  the  connection  between  the  North-west  and  the  Atlantic, 
and  pronounced  by  all  who  have  surveyed  it  as  one  of  the  most  economical 
and  practical  ways  across  the  Blue  Ridge  and  the  Alleghanies  "to  be  found 
from  the  head -waters  of  the  Susquehanna  to  the  southern  termination  of 
those  ranges." 

The  extensive  marl-beds  of  the  South  Carolina  lowlands,  all  comparatively 
near  Charleston,  have  long  been  known ;  but  they  were  first  especially  noticed 
by  Edmund  Ruffin,  of  Virginia,  a  noted  agriculturist,  who  had  been  very  suc- 
cessful in  renovating  worn-out  lands  in  his  own  State  with  marl.  He  examined 
the  South  Carolina  marls,  and  found  them  much  richer  in  carbonate  of  lime 
than  those  of  Virginia,  but  the  carbonate  was  so  combined  with  and  miner- 
alized by  silex,  oxide  of  iron,  phosphate  of  lime,  and  other  substances,  as  to 
necessitate  a  chemical  change  by  burning  before  it  could  be  applied  to  agri- 
cultural purposes. 

Among  these  marl  deposits,  which  abound  in  the  immediate  vicinity  of 
Charleston,  are  found  hard  nodular  bodies  of  all  sizes,  varying  from  that  of  a 


"The  highways  leading;  out  of  the  city  are  all  richly 
embowered  in  loveliest  foliage."     [Page  451.] 


•  # 


45o 


THE   PHOSPHATES   OF   SOUTH   CAROLINA. 


pm's  head  to  masses  weighing  hundreds  of  pounds.  These  nodules  are  now 
known  as  phosphate  rock,  and  have  been  described  as  "  incalculable  heaps  of 
animal  remains  thrown  or  washed  together."  Beautiful  specimens  of  ribs 
vertebras,  and  teeth  of  land  and  sea  monsters  of  the  early  tertiary  period  are 
found  in  profusion  at  a  little  distance  below  the  surface,  and  are  readily  dug 
up  with  pick  and  shovel.  The  negroes  are  said  even  to  dive  for  them  to  the 
river-beds,  and  to  bring  up  large  quantities. 

The  people  have  at  last  awakened  to  the  immense  value  of  these  deposits 
and  a  number  of  establishments  devoted  to  their  conversion  into  phosphate- 
manures  have  sprung  up  since  the  war.  In  these  manufactories  the  nodules 
are  baked  thoroughly  dry,  then  ground  to  a  powder,  which  is  finally  mixed  with 
sulphuric  acid  and  charged  with  ammonia.     The  Wando  Company,  which  first 


Magnolia  Cemetery  — Charleston.     [Page  451.] 


undertook  the  production  of  these  fertilizers,  made  thirty  per  cent,  profit  and  there 
are  now  two  dozen  companies  in  the  State  organized  for  the  purposes  either  of 
Z-M  ?  ™anufacturing  the^  Phosphates.  One  company  is  organized  with  a 
capita  of  $2,000,000  to  mine  in  all  the  navigable  rivers  in  the  State;  and  there  are 
several  manufacturing  corporations  which  have  each  a  million  dollars  capital 
ine  fctiwan  Company  claims  to  have  the  largest  acid-chamber  in  the  United 

non  Jm      f  m  .Wand°'  EtiWan'  Padfk'  Guano>  AtIantic>   Stono  and  Wap- 

poo  mills    four  or  five  millions  of  dollars  have  been  invested  since   1868. 

opedTS  iaVS  t  u6^7'  thGre  ^  a  Variet^  °f  °thers  already  devel- 
ops blmt  ,  P;°miSe  ^  fUtUrG  SUCCGSS-  In  the  manufacture 
of  doors,  blinds,  sashes,  and  machinery,  and   in  ship  -  building,  a  large  capital 


DESERTED      HOMES      AND      PLANTATIONS.  451 

is  invested.  The  enterprising  citizens  are  even  constructing  ready-made  houses 
and  churches,  which  can  be  shipped  in  sections  to  new  States  and  territories. 
A  cotton-mill  and  several  tanneries  are  projected.  The  "truck  farms"  vie 
with  those  of  Norfolk,  and  are  supplying  the  Northern  markets  with  early 
vegetables.  The  city's  jobbing  trade  amounted  to  about  $6,000,000  in  1872, 
and  steadily  increases  at  the  rate  of  twenty- five  per  cent. 

The  highways  leading  out  of  the  city  are  all  richly  embowered  in  loveliest 
foliage  ;  the  oak,  the  magnolia,  the  myrtle,  the  jessamine,  vie  with  each  other  in 
tropical  splendor.  Splendid  shell  roads  have  been  projected,  but  are  not  yet 
completed.  The  visitor  hardly  knows  which  most  to  admire — the  cultivated 
bloom  and  glory  of  the'  gardens,  the  tangled  thickets  where  the  luxuriant  cane 
rises  thirty  and  forty  feet,  the  shimmering  sheets  of  water  on  the  marshes,  or  the 
long  sandy  pathways,  over  which  stretch  the  long  arms  of  moss-hung  oaks.  A 
palmetto,  standing  lonely  under  the  rich  glow  of  the  splendid  Southern  moon, 
will  fill  even  the  prosaic  with  poetic  enthusiasm ;  a  cabin,  overgrown  with  vines 
and  tendrils,  and  half  concealed  in  a  green  and  odorous  thicket,  behind  which 
one  catches  the  gleam  of  the  river  current,  will  make  one  enamored  of  the  sweet 
silence  and  restful  perfection  of  the  lowland  capital's  suburbs.  The  mansion  with 
closed  doors,  and  decaying  verandas,  from  which 

"  Life  and  thought  have  gone  away," 

will  recall  the  late  revolution's  worst  phase  to  him  who  had  almost  forgotten  it  in 
the  city's  commercial  bustle. 

Along  the  Ashley,  the  old  manorial  houses  and  estates,  like  Drayton  Hall 
and  the  Middleton  homestead,  stand  like  sorrowful  ghosts  lamenting  the  past;  on 
James's  Island  one  may  wander  among  rich  cotton  plantations,  now  overspread- 
ing the  maze  of  fortifications  which  sprang  up  during  the  war ;  there  is  no  more 
silence  and  absolute  calm,  as  there  is  no  more  of  beauty  and  luxuriance,  in  Magnolia 
cemetery,  than  in  the  vast  parks  surrounding  these  ruined  and  desolate  homes. 
The  monuments  in  the  cemetery  to  Simons,  and  Legare,  and  Colonel  Washing- 
ton, and  Vanderhorst,  are  beautiful  and  tasteful ;  so  are  the  battered  and  broken 
monuments  to  a  dead  civilization  and  a  broken-down  system  which  one  finds 
upon  the  old  plantations. 

There  is  a  wide  belt  of  forsaken  plantations  near  the  Cooper  river,  along 
the  famous  Goose  creek,  upon  whose  banks  stands  the  venerable  St.  James's 
Church,  built  in  171 1.  Around  this  ancient  building  the  ambitious  forest 
is  fast  weaving  a  network  difficult  to  penetrate ;  and  the  very  graves  are 
hidden  under  festoons  of  wild  vines  and  flowers.  Along  the  harbor  there 
are  also  deserted  and  bankrupt  towns,  like  pretty  Mount  Pleasant,  filled  with 
moss-grown  and  rotting  houses,  whose  owners  have  fled,  unless  too  poor 
to  get  away. 

The  climate  of  South  Carolina  being  as  mild  and  genial  as  that  of  the 
most  favored  portion  of  southern  Europe,  it  is  not  strange  that  the  lower 
classes  of  Italy  and  other  countries  should  feel  inclined  to  emigrate  to  the 
Palmetto  State.     But  the  people  have  been  slow  to  show  a  proper  intelligence 


452 


IMMIGRATION THE      NEGRO    S      VIEWS      OF      IT. 


on  the  subject  of  immigration.  The  legislators  have  taken  care  to  encourage  cer- 
tain Northern  classes  to  come — since  they  are  sure  that  they  will  not;  and  have 
discouraged  foreigners  from  attempting  to  settle  in  the  State,  since  they  fear  that 
might  lead  to  a  new  deal  in  politics.  The  Italians  who  went  into  the  common- 
wealth some  time  since  were  offered  $100  per  year,  and  a  little  meal  and 
bacon  weekly ;  but  they  haughtily  rejected  any  such  terms.  The  white  laborer 
who  enters  South  Carolina  must  be  offered  good  wages  and  given  land  at  cheap 
rates ;  and  the  sooner  the  natives  learn  that  he  is  not  to  be  expected  to  work 
and  live  as  the  negroes  do,  the  better  it  will  be  for  their  interest. 

Recently  the  whites  have  become  thoroughly  aroused  to  the  importance  of 
this  subject,  and  there  is  a  great  change  in  the  temper  with  which  immigrants 
are  now  received.     The  determination  seems  to  be  to  make  much  of  them  as 


Garden  in  Mount  Pleasant,  opposite  Charleston.     [Page  451.] 


a  sure,  if  slow,  means  of  working  out  the  political  regeneration  of  the  State, 
and  securing  its  material  prosperity.  A  State  Commissioner  of  Immigration 
was  appointed  by  the  late  Taxpayers'  Convention,  and  the  counties  are  appoint- 
ing local  Commissioners.  An  effort  is  now  making  at  Charleston  to  establish 
a  direct  steamship  line  to  Liverpool,  which,  it  is  hoped,  will  not  only  give  a 
stimulus  to  immigration,  but  to  inward  freights  as  well. 

The  negro  is  not  especially  anxious  to  see  immigration  come  in.  The 
spirit  of  race  is  strong  within  him.  He  is  desirous  of  seeing  the  lands  in  the 
commonwealth  in  the  hands  of  his  own  people  before  the  rest  of  the  world's 
poor  are  invited  to  partake.  He  is  impressed  with  the  idea  that  South  Caro- 
lina should  be  in  some  measure  a  black  man's  government,  and  is  jealous  of 


THE      AFRICAN'S      SPIRIT     OF     RACE. 


453 


white  intervention.  This  is  not  the  sentiment,  certainly,  of  the  intelligent  and 
refined  colored  people,  but  the  mass  are  ignorant,  and  think  that  they  are 
right  in  taking  that  stand.  The  black  man  lets  the  African  in  him  run  riot 
for  the  time  being.  He  even  dislikes  to  see  the  mulatto  progress ;  and  when 
he  criticises  him,  it  is  as  he  were  necessarily  an  inferior. 

So,  too,  the  negro  secretly  dislikes  the  white  adventurer,  or  "  carpet-bagger," 
as  our  Southern  friends  call  him.  Black  rogue  has  quickly  learned  from  white 
rogue  alf  he  wishes  to  know,  and  now  proposes  to  go  alone.  The  idea  of 
Nemesis,  added  to  the  negro's  lack  of  moral  consciousness,  which  has  become  so 
pronounced  in  the  two  centuries  of  servitude,  makes  the  negro  believe  that  he  is 
right  in  stealing  and  oppressing.  He  has  found,  now  that  he  has  obtained  power, 
a  strange  fascination  in  the  use  of  political  machinery  for  purposes  of  oppression 
and  spoliation.  He  thinks  too,  grimly,  in  the  words  of  the  Carolinian  black's 
savage  song: 

"  De  bottom  rail 's    on  de  top, 
An'  we  's  gwine  to  keep  it  dar." 


Peeping   Through. 


m 


j 


LI. 

THE     SPOLIATION     OF     SOUTH     CAROLINA. 

THE  political  troubles  between  the  white  and  the  black  natives  in  South 
Carolina  began  directly  after  the  close  of  the  war.  The  mass  of  undis- 
franchised  whites,  embittered  by  and  disgusted  with  the  revolution,  refused  to 
have  anything  whatever  to  do  with  the  new  edifice  which  the  negroes  were 
trying  to  upbuild.  Had  they  frankly  accepted  the  situation,  they  might  have 
had  a  share  in  the  framing  of  the  new  Constitution.  The  negroes,  left  alone, 
were  soon  interested  in  the  advent  of  white  strangers,  who  agreed  to  teach 
them  the  political  role  they  were  called  upon  to  play.  Some  of  these  new- 
comers were  honest  men;  others  were  thieves.  The  convention  for  the  making 
of  a  new  Constitution  was  at  once  a  ludicrous  and  an  impressive  gathering. 
The  Constitution  was  ratified  at  a  general  election,  held  on  the  14th,  15th, 
and  16th  days  of  April,  1868.  South  Carolina  then  entered  upon  her  first 
experience  of  negro  government. 

Governor  Orr  left  the  State  executive  chair  on  July  6,  1 868.  The  common- 
wealth then  had  a  bonded  debt  of  about  $5,500,000,  and  a  floating  indebtedness 
amounting  to  perhaps  $1,500,000  more.  While  the  condition  of  the  finances 
was  not  hopeful,  it  was  still  far  from  desperate.  People  hoped  that  a  new 
railroad  development  would  open  up  fresh  trade,  that  money  would  flow  in. 
The  abominable  and  atrocious  outrages  of  the  Ku-Klux,  however,  were  an 
effective  obstacle  to  Northern  immigration. 

The  Klan  was  imported  into  South  Carolina  in  1868,  before  the  present 
State  Government  was  organized ;  and  the  white  population  of  the  ruder  and 
remote  counties  tried  to  inaugurate  a  reign  of  terror  among  the  negroes.  The 
chairman  of  the  Republican  State  Central  Committee  was  brutally  murdered 
in  the  fall  of  1868.  Hundreds  of  men  were  taken  from  their  homes  at  night 
and  whipped  ;  some  were  murdered.  The  result  was  the  interference  of  the 
Federal  Government,  the  arrest  and  imprisonment  of  members  of  the  organ- 
ization, and  the  breaking  up  of  its  secret  operations. 

But  while  society  was  completely  unsettled,  while  the  whites  were  smarting 
under  the  humiliation  of  being  crowded  out  of  the  representation  to  which 
they  were  entitled,  while  the  negro  was  master,  and  was  beginning  to  be 
insolent  and  aggressive,  the  Legislature  met.  The  first  session  after  recon- 
struction was  held  in  August  of  1868.  At  a  later  session,  Governor  Scott, 
formerly  an  agent  of  the  Freedmen's  Bureau,  sent  in  his  first  message,  in  which 
he  reviewed  the  financial  condition  of  the  State,  and  the  Ku-Klux  outrages, 
then  at  their  height,  and  counseled  moderation  and  firmness. 


THE      EPOCH      OF     CORRUPTION     IN      SOUTH     CAROLINA.  455 

The  negroes  nearly  filled  both  Senate  and  House ;  there  were  but  few  white 
members  during  the  first  session,  when  the  ignorant  blacks  were  learning  parlia- 
mentary forms,  for  which,  by  the  way,  they  have  an  extraordinary  aptitude. 
Jobs  began  to  appear,  and  the  first  drawing  of  blood  may  be  said  to  have  been 
in  connection  with  the  job  for  the  redemption  of  the  bills  of  the  bank  of  the  State. 
The  strong  influenced  the  weak ;  the  negro,  dazzled  and  enlivened  by  the  pros- 
pect of  the  reception  of  sums  which  seemed  to  him  colossal  fortunes,  soon  became 
an  apt  scholar,  and  needed  but  little  prompting  from  his  white  teachers.  Meas- 
ures for  authorizing  the  Governor  to  borrow  on  the  credit  of  the  State  were  at 
once  inaugurated  ;  and  then  began  a  series  of  acts  whose  results  are  without  a 
parallel  in  the  history  of  revolutions. 

During  the  four  years  from  1868  to  1872  inclusive,  the  bonded  debt  was 
increased  from  five  and  a-half  to  sixteen  millions,  and  the  floating  debt,  which 
could  be  only  vaguely  ascertained,  amounted  to  several  millions  more.  The 
following  tabular  statement  of  the  debt  is  compiled  from  the  books  of  the  State 
Treasurer : 

Legal   bonded   debt $9,886,627 .  35 

Illegal   bonded   debt 5,965,000  00 

Legal  floating   debt 2,429,272  .  95 

Illegal   floating   debt 2,692, 102  .  94 

Contingent   liabilities 4,797,608 .  20 

Total $25,770,611 .44 

If  the  actual  and  contingent  liabilities,  bonded  and  floating  debt,  legal  and 
illegal,  are  to  be  taken  into  account,  then  the  actual  debt  is  the  whole  amount 
stated  above;  and  less  in  proportion  as  any  of  the  constituent  items  are  excluded. 

Honest  Republicans  had  raised  their  voices  loudly  against  the  infamies  which 
were  the  cause  of  this  terrible  increase ;  had  endeavored  to  oust  the  thieves,  and 
failing,  had  left  the  party  in  disgust.  The  negroes  were  intoxicated  with  power, 
and  would  hear  of  nothing  which  seemed  likely  to  better  the  condition  of  their 
old  masters. 

In  1870,  the  Conservatives,  as  the  white  natives  style  themselves,  alarmed  at 
the  riot  of  corruption  and  the  total  disregard  of  decency  manifested  by  the  gov- 
erning powers,  rallied  and  made  a  decided  effort  to  get  the  State  into  their  own 
hands.  They  nominated  R.  B.  Carpenter,  a  Republican  Circuit  Judge,  for  Gov- 
ernor, on  the  simple  yet  broad  platform  of  retrenchment  and  reform.  On  their 
tickets  a  few  negroes  were  represented,  and  for  the  first  time  in  the  history  of 
the  State,  negroes  and  Conservative  whites  spoke  upon  the  same  political  stump. 
But  the  leaders  of  the  negroes  refused  to  believe  in  the  sincerity  of  the  ex- Con- 
federates, and  Governor  Scott  was  re-elected  over  Carpenter.  The  Ring  which  was 
soiling  its  guilty  fingers  with  plunder  was  jubilant;  honest  Republicans  hung  their 
heads  with  shame  and  gave  up  all  hope  of  the  State;  the  native  white  Carolinians, 
angered  and  distressed,  and  fearing  that  the  negroes  might  undertake  some 
measures  to  which  resistance  would  be  necessary,  formed  themselves  into  a 
"council  of  safety."  This  is  said  really  to  have  been  simply  an  organization 
to    enable    planters    to    protect   themselves    against   strikes,  at   most   a   purely 


456  PLUNDERING      OF     THE     STATE     TREASURY. 

defensive  organization,  and  not  an  attempt  at  a  revival  of  Ku-Kluxism,  as  it  has 
sometimes  been  called.  It  had  no  hold  in  the  lower  part  of  the  State,  but  in 
the  upper  counties  seems  to  have  been  perverted  into  Ku-Kluxism. 

The  offer  of  amity  which  it  had  cost  the  pride  of  the  Conservatives  such  an 
abasement  to  make  is  not  likely  to  be  repeated  at  once.  The  struggle  was 
great,  the  result  unsatisfactory.  People  now  grimly  submit  to  be  robbed  without 
attempting  resistance  save  at  election-time.  But  the  hostility  which  they 
naturally  feel  toward  the  acts  of  the  present  State  Administration  is  constantly 
increased ;  and  in  the  biting  criticisms  evoked  from  the  press  of  Charleston  so 
much  truth  has  been  told  that  the  outside  world  has  begun  to  believe  in  the  state- 
ment that  the  revolution  has  been  made  an  instrument  of  fraud  and  oppression. 

Although  it  would  seem  an  infamy  simply  to  deliberately  increase  the  debt 
of  a  State  which  had  been  so  terribly  impoverished  as  had  South  Carolina  by  the 
war  (her  total  valuation  having  decreased  in  ten  years  from  $489,319,128  to 
$164,409,941),  this  was  but  the  beginning  of  the  outrage.  Not  only  was  the 
debt  increased,  but  the  revenues  of  the  State  were  diverted  from  their  proper 
channels  into  the  pockets  of  the  thieves ;  and  it  has  been  incontrovertibly  proven 
that  millions  have  been  added  to  the  State  debt  without  the  authority  of  the 
Legislature.  By  the  official  statement  of  the  Treasurer  of  the  Commonwealth, 
the  public  debt  at  the  close  of  the  fiscal  year  ending  October  31,  1871,  amounted" 
to  $15,851,327.35.  This  showed  an  actual  increase  since  the  advent  of  the 
reconstruction  legislature  of  $10,500,000,  of  which  amount  only  $4,389,400  had 
ever  been  in  any  manner  authorized  by  the  legal  representatives  of  the  State. 
And  it  is  considered  certain  that  in  1872  there  were  already  afloat  upon  the  market, 
very  possibly  in  the  hands  of  innocent  holders,  without  any  authority  in  their 
original  issue,  some  $6,000,000  in  conversion  bonds ;  and  it  was  found  necessary 
to  introduce  an  act,  in  1872,  to  ratify  and  confirm  this  illegal  issue,  for  which  the 
"  Financial  Board,"  composed  of  the  Governor,  the  State  Treasurer,  and  the 
Attorney- General,  were  responsible.* 

Immense  sums  of  money  were  collected  during  the  four  years  from  1868  to 
the  beginning  of  1872.  The  people  of  the  State  contributed  $3,780,000  in  taxes, 
and  the  financial  agents  at  New  York  sold  bonds  to  the  amount  of  $2,282,000. 
Add  to  this  $1,000,000  of  taxes  collected  up  to  the  close  of  1872,  and  it  will  be 
seen  that  more  than  $7,000,000  went  into  the  Treasury  during  two  admin- 
istrations. 

This  revenue,  which,  in  view  of  the  impoverishment  caused  by  the  war,  was 
very  encouraging,  has  been  stolen  from  the  State  in  a  variety  of  ways.  The 
officers  have  never  been  governed  by  the  Appropriation  acts ;  have  never  been 
limited  by  them.  The  money  appropriated  for  one  purpose  has  been  unblush- 
ingly  expended  for  another.  No  honest  debts  were  paid  with  all  the  monej^ 
collected  from  the  white  people  who  are  denied  the  right  of  representation  in  this 

*At  the  last  session,  1873-74,  an  act  was  passed  declaring  that  these  bonds,  known  as  Con- 
version Bonds,  amounting  to  $5,965,000  were  put  upon  the  market  "without  any  authority  of 
law,"  and  were  "  absolutely  null  and  void."  A  joint  resolution  was  passed  for  the  prosecution  of 
the  ex-State  Treasurer,  but  this  joint  resolution  is  "  lost "  from  the  records. 


THE     LAND    COMMISSION  —  THE     SINKING    FUND.  457 

black  Legislature, — not  a  debt  during  the  year  1873.  The  bondholders  have  not 
received  the  interest  upon  their  bonds. 

The  frauds  to  which  the  Legislature  lent  itself  and  which  private  individuals 
perpetrated,  were  contemptible.  A  land  commission  was  established.  It  was 
ostensibly  beneficent.  Its  apparent  purpose  was  to  buy  up  lands,  and  distribute 
them  among  the  freedmen.  An  appropriation  of  $700,000  was  granted  for  that 
purpose.  The  State  was  at  once  robbed.  Worthless  land  was  purchased  and 
sold  at  fabulous  sums  to  the  Government.  The  commissioners  were  generally 
accused  of  extensive  corruption.  When  at  last  an  honest  commissioner  came  in 
it  was  found  that  a  quarter  of  a  million  dollars  had  been  stolen.  The  "Sinking 
Fund  Commission,"  is  another  "oubliette"  into  which  money  raised  from  the  State 
sinks  mysteriously.  The  commissioners  of  this  fraud  were  authorized  to  take 
and  sell  real  and  personal  property  belonging  to  the  State,  and  to  report  annu- 
ally to  the  Legislature  the  sums  received.  Public  property  has  rapidly  disap- 
peared, but  no  report  has  ever  been  made.*  The  pockets  of  an  unknown  few 
contain  the  proceeds  of  much  valuable  State  property. 

This  is  mighty  theft;  colossal  impudence  like  this  was  never  surpassed. 
Never  was  a  revolution,  originally  intended  as  humane,  turned  to  such  base  uses. 
Never  were  thieves  permitted  to  go  unpunished  after  such  bold  and  reckless 
wickedness.  Never  before  were  a  people,  crushed  to  earth,  kept  down  and  throt- 
tled so  long.  The  manliness  which  we  received  as  a  precious  legacy  with  our 
Anglo-Saxon  blood  demands  that  we  should  cry  out,  "  Hold  off  your  hands ! 
Fair  play  !  " 

The  complete  centralization  which  has  been  the  result  of  the  long  continuance 
in  power  of  an  ignorant  Legislature,  controlled  by  designing  -men,  is  shown  in  the 
history  of  the  elections  since  reconstruction.  The  Governor  has  the  power  to 
appoint  commissioners,  who  in  their  turn  appoint  managers  of  elections  in  the 
several  counties.  In  this  manner  the  Governor  has  absolute  control  of  the  elec- 
tions, for  the  managers  are  allowed  to  keep  and  count  the  votes,  and  are  not 
compelled  to  report  for  some  days. 

The  chances  thus  given  for  fraud  are  limitless.  For  the  last  four  years  men 
who  have  been  elected  by  overwhelming  majorities  have  been  coolly  counted  out, 
because  they  were  distasteful  to  the  powers  that  be.  The  negroes  intimidate 
their  fellows  who  desire  to  vote  reform  tickets,  very  much  as  the  Ku-Klux  once 
intimidated  them.      "The  villainy  you  teach  me  I  will  execute." 

People  will  say  that  this  is  a  black  picture.  It  is ;  there  is  no  light  upon  it. 
There  seems  small  hope  for  a  change.  The  election  this  year  will  oust  some 
plunderers,  but  will  not  be  likely  to  check  corruption.  The  white  people  of  the 
State  are  powerless  to  resist;   they  are  trampled  completely  down. 

It  is  impossible  to  here  review  in  detail  all  the  transactions  of  the  Legis- 
lature since   1868.      Besides  the  schemes  for  corruption  above  mentioned,  there 

*An  investigating  committee  of  the  State  Senate  on  the  sinking  fund  reported,  in  February 
1874,  that  the  proceedings  of  the  Sinking  Fund  Commission  have  resulted  in  nothing  but  loss  to 
the  State  ;  that  a  large  amount  of  property  had  been  sold,  and  not  a  dollar  of  the  public  debt  had 
been  extinguished. 


458  VARIOUS      FRAUDS COLUMBIA. 

have  been  very  many  others.  Nothing  has  been  safe  from  the  taint.  Bribery 
has  been  necessary  to  secure  the  passage  of  almost  every  bill.  Railroad  legisla- 
tion has  been  a  stench  in  honest  men's  nostrils.  The  pay  certificates  of  the 
Legislature  have  even  been  abused.  The  Speaker  of  the  House  has  issued  these 
certificates  to  the  amount  of  more  than  a  million  dollars,  while  the  legitimate 
demand  for  them  has  not  amounted  to  $150,000.  They  have  been  spread  broad- 
cast. The  refurnishing  of  the  new  State-House  cost  hardly  $50,000,  but  a  bill 
for  $95,000  was  presented.  Members  of  the  Legislature,  both  black  and  white, 
publicly  threatened  that  unless  they  received  sums  which  they  named  they  would 
vote  against  certain  bills.  A  Governor  stands  charged  by  men  of  his  own  party 
with  spending  nearly*$400,ooo  of  the  public  money  to  get  himself  re-chosen.  A 
bill  to  establish  a  militia  became  a  gigantic  "job."  The  whole  course  of  legisla- 
tion in  the  State  tended  to  absolute  tyranny,  which  is  all  the  more  dreadful 
because  the  deluded  ignoramuses  who  make  up  the  body  of  the  assemblies  are 
not  aware  that  they  are  doing  anything  especially  blamev/orthy.  They  look 
upon  it  as  the  result  of  a  normal  condition  of  things,  and  intend  to  keep  it  up  as 
long  as  there  is  any  vestige  of  State  credit  left. 

Columbia  has  been  the  capital  of  South  Carolina  since  1790.  It  occupies  a 
high  and  commanding  position  in  the  centre  of  the  State,  and  is  but  130  miles 
from  Charleston.  It  borders  upon  the  Congar.ee  river,  near  the  mouth  of  the 
Saluda,  in  the  heart  of  a  rich  cotton  region.  The  water  power  which  might  be 
made  available  in  its  immediate  vicinity  is  much  superior  to  that  of  most  of  the 
New  England  manufacturing  towns.  The  canal  near  by  was  purchased  from 
the  State  several  years  ago  by  Governor  Sprague,  of  Rhode  Island  ;  but  no  cot- 
ton factories  have  as  yet  arisen  along  the  banks.  The  town  is  one  of  the  most 
beautiful  in  the  South ;  its  climate  rivals  that  of  Italy ;  and  the  broad,  richly 
shaded  avenues;  the  gardens  filled  with  jessamines  and  japonicas,  laurels  and  haw- 
thorns and  hollys,  and  the  perfect  groves  in  which  the  live  oaks,  the  pines,  the 
magnolias,  and  the  wild  oranges  vie  with  each  other  in  charm,  give  it  an  especial 
fascination.  Columbia  arose  with  sorrowful  but  reliant  air  out  of  the  ashes 
in  which  it  was  laid  by  the  war ;  and  if  its  people  had  not  been  weighted  down 
by  the  incubus  of  an  ignorant  and  dishonest  government,  they  would  have  done 
more  even  than  they  already  have  toward  rebuilding.  The  little  city,  which  now 
has  about  12,000  inhabitants,  is  on  the  through  route  from  Charlotte  in  North 
Carolina,  to  Augusta  in  Georgia,  and  also  sends  its  commercial  influence  into  the 
north-western  counties,  along  the  line  of  the  Greenville  and  Columbia  railroad, 
on  which  Newberry  and  other  thriving  towns  are  located.  It  has  also  an  excel- 
lent connection  with  Wilmington  on  the  North  Carolina  coast  via  Sumter,  a  busy 
town,  a  short  distance  to  the  westward  of  Columbia. 

The  counties  of  Richland,  Sumter,  Orangeburg,  Lexington,  and  Clarendon,  in 
the  neighborhood  of  the  capital,  are  exempt  from  the  malaria  of  the  lowlands,  and 
cotton,  corn,  and  other  cereals,  grow  superbly.  The  great  conflagration  at  the 
time  of  the  evacuation  of  the  city  by  the  Confederates,  swept  away  the  Govern- 
ment armory,  the  old  State- House,  some  manufactories,  all  the  railway  stations, 
a  fine  legislative  library,  St.  Mary's  College,  with  many  valuable  collections  of 


EXTERIOR      ASPECTS      OF      COLUMBIA. 


459 


paintings ;  the  retreating  Confederates  destroyed  the  bridges  over  the  river,  and 
ruin  reigned  everywhere. 

The  exterior  aspects  of  Columbia  are  to-day  fair  indeed.  The  venerable 
University  (from  which  all  the  white  professors  and  scholars  retreated  when  the 
first  black  student  was  received)  nestles  charmingly  in  the  midst  of  a  grand  tree- 
dotted  park ;  the  State  Lunatic  Asylum,  a  noble  building,  is  likewise  embowered 
in  a  splendid  shade ;  the  city  buildings  and  hotels  are  large,  and  in  excellent 
taste;  a  fine  United  States  court-house  is  springing  out  of  blocks  of  native  gran- 
ite ;  and  the  numerous  private  institutions  of  learning  give  the  casual  visitor  the 
impression  that  he  is  visiting  a  "grove  of  Academe,"  rather  than  a  perturbed  and 
harassed  capital.  Many  Northern  families  have  purchased  fine  estates  in  the 
neighborhood;  at  evening  the  avenues  are  crowded  with  splendid  teams,  whose 
owners  drive  to  the  parade  ground,  and  loiter,  while  six  companies  of  United 
States  troops  go  stiffly  through  the  prescribed  drill,  and  the  band  thunders  the 
hackneyed  music. 


A  Future  Politician. 


~tL^^As*      xhjx^    xioU     ,.\j»JJLL,    <bJto^    cTI.Xk-c    j?(tL*X*M 


LII. 


THE     NEGROES   IN     ABSOLUTE     POWER. 


BUT  it  is  at  the  State- House  in  Columbia  that  one  arrives  at  the  truth. 
The  mammoth  building,  which  yet  lacks  the  stately  cupola  to  be  given 
it  in  a  few  years,  is  furnished  with  a  richness  and  elegance  which  not  even 
the  legislative  halls  of  States  a  hundred  times  as  rich  can  equal.  In  the 
poorly  constructed  and  badly  lighted  corridors  below  are  the  offices  of  the  State 
Government — that  of  the  Governor,  the  Treasurer,  the  Secretary  of  State,  and 

the  Superintendent  of  State 


Schools — each  and  all  of 
them  usually  filled  with 
colored  people,  discussing 
the  issues  of  the  hour.  The 
Secretary  of  State  is  a 
mulatto,  who  has  entered 
the  law  school  at  the  Uni- 
versity, and  carries  on  his 
double  duties  very  credit- 
ably. 

In  the  House  and  Sen- 
ate the  negro  element 
stands  out  conspicuous. 
On  the  occasion  of  my  first 
visit  I  was  shown  into  the 
room  of  the  House  Committee  on  the  Judiciary  for  a  few  moments.  While 
awaiting  the  assembling  of  the  honorable  members  a  colored  gentleman,  in  a 
gray  slouch  hat,  and  a  pair  of  spectacles,  engaged  me  in  conversation,  and,  as  I 
inquired  what  was  the  present  question  which  was  exciting  the  patriotism  and 
sacrifice  of  the  virtuous  members,  he  rolled  up  his  eyes,  and  with  a  tragic 
air,  said : 

"  Dar  's  a  heap  o'  bizness  behin'  de  carpet  heah,  sah." 

It  was  true,  in  more  senses  than  one. 

The  Hoase,  when  I  visited  it,  was  composed  of  eighty-three  colored  members, 
all  of  whom  were  Republicans,  and  forty- one  whites ;  the  Senate  consisted  of 
fifteen  colored  men,  ten  white  Republicans,  and  eight  white  Democrats.  The 
President  of  the  Senate  and  the  Speaker  of  the  House,  both  colored,  were  elegant 
and  accomplished  men,  highly  educated,  who  would  have  creditably  presided 
over  any  commonwealth's  legislative  assembly.     In  the  House  the  negroes  were 


The  State -House  at  Columbia,  South  Carolina. 


THE      NEGROES      AND     THEIR      LEGISLATIVE     SPEECHES.  46 1 

of  a  much  lower  grade,  and  more  obviously  ignorant,  than* £**%L ^Z 
were  oerpetually  preventing  the  transaction  of  necessary  business  by  <i^oas 
of priv.1  ge"  and^' points  of  order,"  of  which,  sometimes,  as  many  as  a  hundred 
a  eP  Li  ed  n  a  single  day.  It  being  an  extra  session,  they  were  endeavoring  to 
make  h  last  until  the  time  for  the  assembling  of  the  regular  one;  and  their  effort 
"ere  extremely  ludicrous.  The  little  knot  of  white  Democrats,  massed  together 
Tn  netctionof  the  hall,  sat  glum  and  scornful  amid  the  mass  ?™  speakers 
a  member  only  rising  now  and  then  to  correet  an  error  of  his  friend  the 
colored  man,  who  had  the  floor. 

But  some  of  the  sable  brethren  were  trying  to  the  visitor's  patience,  eyen  and 
after  I  had  heard  one  young  man  talk  for  a  half  hour  upon  the  important  subject 
of  what  his  constituents  would  say  if  he  allowed  himself  to  be  brow-beaten  into 
"mediate  adjournment,  it  was  with  difficulty  that  I  could  suppress  a .yaw. 
This  youth  persisted  in  repetitions;  his  voiee  occasionally  would  be  heard 
rising  above  the  general  hum,  precisely  reiterating  the  words  he  had  uttered  five 

"""The5  netTdoes  not  allow  himself  to  be  abashed  by  hostile  criticism.  When 
he  gets  a  sentence  tangled,  or  eannot  follow  the  thread  of  his  own  thought  in 
words  he  will  gravely  open  a  book-the  statutes,  or  some  other  ponderous 
volume  lying  before  him-and,  after  seeming  to  consult  it  for  some  minutes,  will 
resume.     He  has  been  gaining  time  for  a  new  start. 

There  are  men  of  real  force  and  eloquence  among  the  negroes  chosen.to.the 
House,  but  they  are  the  exception.  In  the  Senate  I  noticed  decorum  and 
ability  among  the  members.  Several  of  the  colored  Senators  spoke  exceed 
ingly  well,  and  with  great  ease  and  grace  of  manner ;  others  were  awkward  and 
coarse.  The  white  members,  native  and  imported,  appeared  men  of  alent  at 
least  The  blaek  pages  ran  to  and  fro,  carrying  letters  .and  documents  to  the 
honorable  Senators;  and  a  fine-looking  quadroon,  "P^^^ 
and  the  ebony  gentleman  escorting  her,  were  admitted  to  the  floor  of  the  Senate, 
and  sat  for  some  time  listening  to  the  debates. 

To  the  careless  observer  it  seems  encouraging  to  see  the  negroes,  so  lately 
freed  from  a  semi-barbaric  condition,  doing  so  well,  because  their  conduct  is 
.really  better  than  one  would  suppose  them  capable  of,  after  having  seen  the 
constituency  from  which  they  were  elevated.  One  cannot  of  course,  prevent 
reflections  upon  vengeance  and  retribution  drifting  into  his  m.nd-it  was, 
doubtless,  to  be  expected  that  some  day  the  negro  would  lord  it  over  his  master, 
as  the  law  of  compensation  is  immutable,-but  there  is  danger  in  the  protraction 
of  this  vengeance.  We  must  really  see  fair  play.  Ignorance  must  not  be  allowed 
to  run  riot  If  we  saw  it  consummating,  as  a  Commune  assembled  in  Pans,  one 
thousandth  part  of  the  infamy  which  it  effects  as  a  Legislature  in  South  Carolina, 
we  should  cry  out  angrily  for  interference. 

But  this  is  an  epoch  of  transition.  When  the  negro  is  a  little  older  as  a 
politician,  he  will  be  less  clannish.  The  masses  of  the  blacks  will  divide  more 
fully  into  parties.  Then  there  will  be  some  chance  for  the  setting  aside  ot  tne 
dreadful  question  of  race  against  race.     At  present  the  blacks  in  the  State  move 


462 


THE     UNIVERSITY  —  A      REVOLUTION      IN      ITS     CONDUCT. 


solidly  together.  Their  eyes  are  fixed  on  the  spoils  which  the  white  men  have 
taught  them  to  gather.  They  have  not  yet  begun  to  understand  that  in  strip- 
ping the  State,  compromising  her  credit  and  blackening  her  reputation,  they 
injure  themselves  much  more  than  they  harm  their  old  masters.  They  will  learn 
in  time  that  they  have  committed  a  grave  error  in  allowing  the  whites  to  be 
virtually  excluded  from  representation,  and  that  both  races  will  be  forced  to  labor 
together,  honestly  and  faithfully,  to  save  the  State,  and  to  insure  their  own  future 
prosperity. 

I  visited  the  University  a  day  or  two  after  the  revolution  caused  there  by  the 
entrance  of  the  first  colored  student,  the  Secretary  of  State  himself.  In  the 
library,  where  the  busts  of  Calhoun  and  Hayne  seemed  to  look  down  from  their 


Sketches  of  South  Carolina  State  Officers  and  Legislators,  under  the  Moses  Administration. 


niches  with  astonishment  upon  the  changed  order  of  things,  I  saw  the  book  from 
whose  lists  the  white  students  had  indignantly  erased  their  names  when  they  saw 
the  Secretary's  round,  fair  script  beneath  their  own.  The  departure  of  the  old 
professors  and  scholars  was  the  signal  for  a  grand  onward  movement  by  the 
blacks,  and  a  great  number  entered  the  preparatory  and  the  law  schools.     They 


LEGISLATORS      AS      LAW     STUDENTS  —  EDUCATION      IN      THE      STATE.      463 

have  summoned  good  teachers  from  the  North,  and  are  studying  earnestly.  The 
University  attained  its  present  tide  in  1866.  It  was  founded  as  a  college  at  the 
beginning  of  the  century,  but  now  consists  of  ten  distinct  schools,  and  is  rich  in 
libraries  and  apparatus  for  scientific  studies.  While  I  was  in  the  library,  a  coal 
black  senator  arrived,  with  two  members  of  the  House,  whom  he  presented  to 
the  head  of  the  faculty  as  desirous  of  entering  the  law  class.  I  was  informed  that 
dozens  of  members  were  occupied  every  spare  moment  outside  of  the  sessions  in 
faithful  study ;  but  this  has  been  the  case  for  a  short  time  only. 

Except  in  the  large  towns,  however,  the  educational  prospects  throughout  the 
State  are  not  very  good.  In  1873,  the  schools  were  much  cramped  for  resources. 
Not  a  cent  of  an  appropriation  of  these  $300,000  for  educational  purposes,  made 
in  that  year,  reached  the  schools,  and  great  numbers  of  them  were  closed.  The 
difficulty  of  obtaining  good  teachers  has  also  been  very  great.  Charleston  has 
had  a  fine  school  system  for  many  years.  Another  High  School  there,  an  excel- 
lent institution,  has  been  established  since  1839.  The  local  school  tax  for  1873 
was  nearly  $45,000.  There  are  about  2,500  white  children  in  the  public  schools, 
and  about  the  same  number  of  colored  pupils,  for  whom  separate  accommodations 
are  provided.     One  single  edifice  for  the  black  has  room  for  1,000  scholars. 

Four  colored  schools  are  supported  in  Charleston  by  Northern  funds  :  The 
Shaw  Memorial,  a  large  and  efficient  institution,  assisted  by  the  New  England 
Freedmen's  Aid  Society;  the  Wallingford  Academy,  by  the  Presbyterian  Church 
North;  the  Avery  Institute,  by  the  American  Missionary  School  Association  ; 
and  the  Franklin  Street  High  School,  by  the  Episcopal  Church  North.  All  the 
city  free  schools  are  considered  exceedingly  good.  The  Normal  School  in 
Charleston  has  a  fine  edifice,  and  is  sending  out  some  excellent  teachers.  The 
Peabody  fund  has  given  aid  here  and  there  throughout  the  State  to  great 
advantage.  & 

There  are,  at  least,  two  hundred  thousand  children  in  the  commonwealth ; 
and  it  is  safe  to  assert  that  not  more  than  seventy-five  thousand  have  been 
afforded  school  facilities.  Charleston  county  shows  an  attendance  of  nearly 
8,000 ;  in  the  other  coast  counties  there  has  latterly  been  a  large  decrease  in 
attendance.  On  the  sea-islands  there  are  still  some  schools.  An  educational 
effort  was  first  made  there  in  1862,  and  the  school  originally  established  in  St 
Helena  is  yet  in  existence,  supported  by  Philadelphia  societies.  At  one  time 
there  were  twenty  schools  on  St.  Helena  Island  alone,  supported  by  Northern 
funds.  But  now  that  this  aid  has  been  generally  withdrawn,  education  there 
languishes.  The  school  tax  of  three  mills  on  the  dollar  would  serve  very  well,  if 
the  State's  affairs  were  not  so  wretchedly  confused,  and  the  pay  of  the  teachers 
so  uncertain.  The  corruption  in  the  legislative  halls  demoralizes  even  the  free 
school  system,  which  the  negro  once  so  longed  for,  as  the  lever  which  was  to  lift 
him  up  to  happiness.  Columbia,  Beaufort,  the  mountain  towns  of  consequence, 
and  the  shire  towns  of  the  upland  counties,  take  much  interest  in  the  free  school 
system,  and  encourage  it  as  their  means  will  permit. 

The  private  institutions  of  learning  in  Charleston  and  the  State  are  remark- 
ably  excellent.       Few  cities  can  boast  of  better  medical  colleges  than  that  in 


464  Charleston's    charities — the    state's    development. 

Charleston.  It  was  first  incorporated  half  a  century  ago,  and  had  a  brilliant 
career  until  the  late  war,  during  which  it  was  nearly  ruined.  The  Roper  Hos- 
pital, which  adjoins  it,  is  a  fine  institution.  Charleston  is  divided  into  health 
districts,  over  each  of  which  a  physician  is  appointed,  with  orders  to  give  daily 
attendance  upon  the  poor.  This  was  a  much  needed  charity,  since  the  mortality 
among  the  negroes  who  came  flocking  into  the  city  after  the  war  was  fearful,  and 
the  blacks  neglect  themselves,  unless  looked  after,  until  it  is  too  late  to  heal 
them. 

The  burden  of  charity  is  by  no  means  small.  The  alms-house  has  more 
than  sixteen  hundred  regular  "  outdoor  pensioners,"  that  is,  poor  residents  who 
receive  "  rations  or  half-rations,"  regularly.  The  city  and  main  hospitals  are 
filled  with  colored  patients,  who  are  cheerfully  cared  for  at  the  city's  expense. 
Charleston  is  jealous  of  her  sanitary  reputation,  and  each  successive  year  that 
passes  without  bringing  the  yellow  fever  only  makes  her  more  vigilant  in  the 
matters  of  her  tidal  drainage,  her  well-ordered  markets,  her  cleanly  docks,  and 
her  careful  supervision  of  the  personal  health  of  her  citizens. 

Two  of  the  noted  institutions  of  Charleston  are  a  little  fallen  into  decay,  but 
are  still  interesting.  The  Military  Academy,  a  quaint,  mauresque  building,  has 
become  the  head-quarters  for  the  United  States  troops  quartered  in  the  city;  and 
its  splendid  school  is  broken  up.  The  Charleston  College  is  still  in  operation.  It 
was  chartered  in  1795,  and  has  graduated  many  distinguished  men.  The  estab- 
lishment of  the  museum  of  natural  history  at  the  college  was  first  suggested  by 
Agassiz  in  1850,  and  it  is  to-day,  although  a  portion  of  the  collection  was 
burned  in  war-time,  one  cf  the  finest  in  the  country.  The  libraries  of  the  pri- 
vate institutions  are  good,  but  Charleston  greatly  needs  a  public  one,  such  as  all 
the  Eastern  cities  possess. 

The  development  of  South  Carolina  presents  an  interesting  problem  for  solu- 
tion. It  seems,  now,  as  if  the  system  of  large  plantations  were  the  only  one 
under  which  rice  culture  can  be  successfully  pursued.  Yet  the  freedmen  yearly 
manifest  stronger  disinclination  for  work  in  gangs  on  other  people's  land,  and 
desire  to  acquire  small  farms,  and  to  live  independently,  however  rudely.  It  is 
singular  that  some  of  them  have  not  developed  the  business  capacity  requisite  to 
establish  large  plantations  of  their  own,  and  to  influence  their  fellows  to  work  well 
with  them  on  a  cooperative  basis.*  The  wealth  in  the  great  pine  forests  cannot 
be  made  available  until  some  one  besides  the  negro  goes  to  work  in  them.  The 
sea-island  cotton-lands  are  certainly  very  unlikely  to  get  the  needed  recupera- 
tion by  much  effort  on  the  part  of  the  negro.  A  new  element  of  immigration 
must  be  had ;  but  it  will  not  go  to  the  State  in  its  present  political  condition. 

Will,  then,  the  State  extricate  herself  from  that  position  ?  There  seems  but 
little  hope  of  any  thorough  immediate  change,  perhaps  not  for  four  years. 
Cumulative  voting  has  been  advocated  in  the  State  for  some  time,  and  in  1870 
the  Attorney- General  and  Governor  Scott  professed  to  be  strongly  in  favor  of 
the  adoption  of  that  principle.     If  this  plan,  as  suggested  by  Mr.  Pike  in  his 

*  There  is,  I  am  told,  one  highly  prosperous  colored  settlement  on  the  communal  plan  in 
Marlborough  county. 


THE      INCUBUS      WHICH      CRIPPLES      THE      STATE. 


465 


excellent  book  on  the  subject,  or  some  other  method  of  gaining  protection  for  the 
rights  of  the  minority,  could  be  successfully  adopted ;  and  if  Charleston  could 
receive  her  just  dues  politically,  the  course  of  events  would,  in  due  time,  be 
changed.  Her  phosphates,  her  railway  connections,  her  cotton  receipts,  her 
manufactories  cannot  fail  to  make  her  rich ;  but  that  will  not  benefit  the  State,  as 
she  is  at  present  situated.  Very  little  teiiance  is  to  be  placed  on  any  hopes  of 
immigration,  save  of  families  who  are  well-to-do,  toward  centres  like  Aiken  and 
Columbia. 

The  farmers  in  the  upland  regions  are  forcing  their  lands  too  harshly  in  their 
desperate  effort  to  make  a  great  deal  of  cotton,  and  are  neglecting  the  needed 
diversity  of  crops,  so  that  they  will,  perhaps,  be  in  distress  by  and  by.  There 
are  hundreds  of  superb  chances  for  investment  in  the  State  which  will  never  for 
a  moment  be  considered  by  capitalists  so  long  as  a  State  Government  so  unjust, 
tyrannical  and  centralized  as  the  present  one  maintains  itself  in  office.  It  is  a 
frightful  incubus  which  drags  down  every  earnest  man  who  desires  to  make  an 
effort  at  a  rebound  after  the  collapse  caused  by  the  war ;  it  is  a  disgrace  to 
our  system ;  it  is  a  stumbling-block  to  the  negro ;  an  embodied  corruption 
which  public  opinion  ought  to  sweep  out  of  existence  ;  a  usurpation  for  which 
there  is  no  excuse  save  the  complete  ignorance  of  one  race,  and  the  utter  help- 
lessness of  the  other. 


Iron  Palmetto  in  the  State -House  Yard  at  Columbia. 


LIII. 

THE      LOWLANDS      OF     NORTH      CAROLINA. 

NORTH  CAROLINA  comprises  an  area  of  a  little  more  than  50,000  square 
miles,  or  34,000,000  of  acres.  From  the  Atlantic  ocean  it  stretches  500 
miles,  back  to  the  Tennessee  line,  and  is  from  100  to  150  miles  wide,  between 
Virginia  and  Georgia.  It  embraces  within  its  limits  almost  every  variety  of  soil 
and  climate.  It  is  very  plainly  separated  into  three  natural  divisions.  The  first 
is  the  "  flat  country  of  swamps  and  marshes  and  sluggish  streams,  supposed 
by  geologists  to  have  been  upheaved  by  the  sea."*  This  extends  100  miles 
inland  from  the  coast.  This  is  the  country  of  the  long- leaved  pine,  the  sandy 
bottoms,  and  the  turpentine  forests,  inhabited  by  a  low  and  almost  worthless 
population.     There,  too,  however,  are  flourishing  towns  and  prosperous  people. 

The  second  region  is  that  of  wheat,  corn,  tobacco,  and  cotton.  The  soil  is 
undulating,  fertile,  and  the  rivers  afford  fine  facilities  for  transportation.  The 
third  division  is  that  of  the  mountains. 

There  is  a  marked  difference  between  the  upland  and  lowland  people  of 
North  Carolina.  The  mountaineers  seem,  in  some  measure,  a  race  by  them- 
selves, and  have  sometimes  made  strong  efforts  to  secure  a  division  of  the 
State.  To-day  there  are  a  few  enthusiastic  advocates  of  the  creation  of  a 
new  commonwealth  out  of  the  mountain  regions  of  North  Carolina  and  Ten- 
nessee. The  mountains  have  certainly  supplied  North  Carolina  with  many  of 
her  famous  politicians,  with  fine  instances  of  prosperity,  and  with  the  example 
of  loyalty  when  she  sadly  needed  it.  But  the  residents  of  the  two  sections 
know  little  of  each  other.  The  railroads  through  the  mountains  will  open  to  the 
lowlanders  a  Paradise  which  has  been  at  their  very  doors,  yet  little  known  by 
them. 

The  North  Carolina  coast,  as  seen  from  the  ocean,  is  flat  and  uninteresting. 
There  is  an  aspect  of  wild  desolation  about  the  swamps  and  marshes  which  one 
may  at  first  find  picturesque,  but  which  finally  wearies  and  annoys  the  eye. 
But  the  coast  is  cut  up  into  a  network  of  navigable  sounds,  rivers  and  creeks, 
where  the  best  of  fish  abound,  and  where  trade  may  some  day  flow  in.  The 
shad  and  herring  fisheries  in  these  inlets  are  already  sources  of  much  profit. 
The  future  export  of  pine  and  cypress  timber,  taken  from  the  mighty  forests, 
will  yield  an  immense  revenue.  The  swampy  or  dry  tracts  along  the  coast  are 
all  capable  of  producing  a  bale  of  cotton  to  the  acre.  They  give  the  most 
astonishing  returns  for  the  culture  of  the  sweet  potato,  the  classic  peanut,  or 

*From  a  published  letter  from  Rev.  Dr.  Mason,  rector  of  Christ's  Church,  Raleigh,  North 
Carolina. 


THE      NORTH      CAROLINA     COAST — BEAUFORT.  467 

"guber,"  the  grape,  and  many  kinds  of  vegetables.  Malarial  fevers  will,  of 
course,  seize  on  the  inhabitant  of  this  region  who  does  not  pay  proper  atten- 
tion to  the  drainage  all  about  him.  It  is  believed  that  along  this  coast  great 
numbers  of  vineyards  will  in  time  be  established,  for  there  are  unrivaled  advan- 
tages for  wine- growing. 

The  extreme  eastern  limit  of  the  State  is  a  narrow  strip  of  land,  separating 
the  ocean  from  the  interior  waters.  It  is  called  the  Banks,  and  is  here  and  there 
broken  by  inlets,  the  most  important  of  which  are  Hatteras,  Ocracoke,  Beaufort, 
and  the  mouth  of  the  Cape  Fear  river.  On  this  narrow  strip,  which  the  ocean 
has  with  great  unwillingness  conceded  the  State,  lives  a  singular  race,  "  half- 
horse,  half- alligator,"  subsisting  by  fishing  and  pilotage.  The  central  point  of 
this  projecting  and  protecting  arm  of  land  is  the  far  and  ill- famed  Hatteras,  the 
terror  of  the  voyager  along  the  stormy  coast. 

"Currituck  Sound,"  one  of  the  notable  features  of  the  lowlands  of  North  Caro- 
lina, separates  the  "  Banks  "  from  the  main  land  just  south  of  the  Virginia  line. 
It  is  a  fresh-water  strait,  varying  in  width  from  three  to  fifteen  miles,  and  in 
winter  is  a  sportsman's  heaven.  Myriads  of  wild  ducks,  geese  and  swans  resort 
there  during  the  cold  months,  and  amateurs  from  every  climate  under  heaven 
visit  the  marshes  and  slaughter  the  fowls  for  months  together.  Albemarle 
and  Croatan  sounds  are  also  notable  fishing  resorts  ;  through  Croatan  one  enters 
into  Pamlico,  and  thence  penetrates  to  Beaufort  Inlet,  on  which  the  town  of 
Beaufort  stands. 

Beaufort  possesses  one  of  the  best  harbors  on  the  Atlantic  coast.  Vessels  can 
come  directly  from  the  deep  sea  to  the  wharves  of  the  Atlantic  and  North  Caro- 
lina Railway  Company  at  Morehead  City,  opposite  Beaufort.  The  town  has 
relapsed  into  comparative  obscurity  since  its  brilliant  war  history,  when  it  was 
the  rendezvous  of  many  navies,  and  the  point  of  departure  for  many  hostile 
expeditions.  Fort  Macon,  at  the  entrance  of  its  harbor,  and  its  surroundings, 
are  interesting,  and  there  are  throngs  of  summer  visitors  along  the  ample  beach. 
The  railroad,  connecting  Beaufort  with  the  interior  of  the  State,  runs  north- 
westward through  Newbern  to  Goldsboro.  The  former  is  an  old  and  pleasant 
town  of  five  or  six  thousand  inhabitants,  at  the  confluence  of  the  Neuse  and 
Trent  rivers,  and  the  latter  is  a  newer  and  smarter  place,  owing  its  growth  mainly 
to  the  increase  of  railroad  facilities.  Newbern  boasts  a  line  of  steamers  to  New 
York,  and  once  had  many  elegant' mansions  and  gardens,  most  of  which  have 
latterly  fallen  into  decay. 

North  Carolina  is  very  well  supplied  with  railways  in  her  lowland  and  middle 
districts.  The  North  Carolina  road  extends  from  Goldsboro  to  Charlotte;  the 
Raleigh  and  Gaston  road,  from  Raleigh  to  Weldon,  thence  giving  an  outlet 
through  Virginia ;  the  Western  road  from  Fayetteville,  on  the  Cape  Fear  river 
mountainward  (probably  before  many  years  to  be  completed) ;  the  Wilmington 
and  Weldon  road  runs  directly  north  and  south  through  the  State;  and  the  Chat- 
ham railroad  penetrates  from  Raleigh  to  the  coal  and  iron-beds  in  Chatham 
county.  The  Air  Line  road  from  Atlanta  gives  a  direct  route  from  Charlotte  in 
North  Carolina,  to  Danville  in  Virginia,  and  thence  north  and  east. 


468  THE     STATE     SINCE     THE     WAR. 

The  lower  regions  of  the  State  abound  in  beautiful  though  quiet  rural  scenery. 
There  are  no  towns  of  considerable  size.  Raleigh  is  a  sleepy,  delightful,  shaded 
old  place.  Wilmington,  although  busy,  is  not  large;  Charlotte  is  small  but  lively. 
Salisbury  and  Greensboro  are  in  the  centre  of  a  rich  mining  region,  where 
copper,  iron,  coal,  and  gold  are  to  be  found ;  the  former  is  the  centre  of  a  lively 
tobacco  trade,  and  the  latter  is  the  point  whence  one  takes  the  railroad  to  States- 
ville  and  Morganton,  the  charming  towns  at  the  outer  line  of  the  mountain 
region.  Salisbury  was  the  seat  of  a  famous  Confederate  prison  in  which  many 
a  Union  soldier  languished  and  died,  or  starved  through  weary  months. 

The  North  Carolinians  are  accustomed  now-a-days  to  wonder  why  immi- 
grants do  not  rush  into  their  State,  and  settle  upon  the  lands  which  can  be  had 
so  cheaply ;  and  finding  that  but  few  come,  and  that  the  State  is  in  a  general 
condition  of  discouragement  and  decay,  financially,  they  have  relapsed  into  an 
indolent  attitude,  and  let  progress  drift  by  them.  In  some  of  the  small  towns  I 
found  the  people  more  inclined  to  bitterness  and  less  reconciled  to  the  results 
of  the  war  than  anywhere  else  in  the  South.  Many  towns,  too,  had  a  deserted 
and  neglected  look  which  was  painful. 

The  State,  of  course,  suffered  greatly  by  the  war.  It  was  one  of  the  fore- 
most of  pro-slavery  communities;  held  nearly  350,000  slaves  when  the  war 
broke  out ;  and  had  a  firmly-seated  and  exclusive  aristocracy,  which  has  natu- 
rally been  very  much  broken  up  by  recent  events.  The  present  population  is 
1,071,361,  of  whom  678,470  are  blacks,  of  by  no  means  the  highest  type. 
The  revolution  decreased  the  value  of  real  and  personal  estate  in  North 
Carolina  from  $292,297,602,  in  i860  to  $132,046,391  in  1870,  and  the  decrease 
within  the  last  four  years  has  been  very  rapid. 

The  evils  of  universal  suffrage  have  been  very  great  in  this  State.  The  great 
mass  of  densely  ignorant  and  ambitious  blacks  suddenly  hurled  upon  the  field 
created  the  wildest  confusion,  and  crushed  the  commonwealth  under  irredeema- 
ble debt.  The  villainy  and  robbery  to  which  the  white  population  of  the  State 
was  compelled  to  submit,  at  the  hands  of  the  plunderers  maintained^  power  by 
the  negro,  did  much  to  destroy  all  possibility  of  a  speedy  reconciliation  between 
the  two  races.  Still,  the  citizens  are  loyal  to  the  Union,  and  are  anxious  to  be  on 
friendly  terms  with  the  North ;  yet  continue  to  regard  Northerners  as  in  some 
way  the  authors  of  the  evils  which  have  befallen  them.  They  do  not,  however, 
reproach  the  North  with  having  sent  them  a  carpet-bagger;  as  the  man  who  did 
them  most  harm,  and  whose  conduct  has  been  most  sharply  criticised,  was  a 
citizen  of  their  own  State. 

The  reconstruction  convention  in  1868  was  a  singular  gathering.  Its  pro- 
ceedings bordered  on  the  ridiculous.  It  finally  secured  a  Constitution  which 
has  since  been  much  amended.  The  judges  and  other  officers  placed  in  power 
were  notoriously  incompetent ;  and  Mr.  Holden,  who  was  appointed  first  pro- 
visional Governor  of  the  State  under  reconstruction,  was  the  author  of  so  much 
questionable  work  that  he  was  successfully  impeached  and  removed.  There  was, 
at  one  time,  imminent  danger  of  civil  war  in  the  State;  several  counties  were 
in  insurrection ;  the  Ku-Klux  flourished  and  committed  all  kinds  of  infamous 


GOV.      HOLDEN'S      CAREER  —  RALEIGH  —  THE      CAPITOL.  469 

outrages.  Holden  was  an  original  secessionist,  and  his  newspaper,  the  Standard, 
printed  at  Raleigh,  was  the  mouth-piece  of  the  Democracy  until  i860,  when  this 
unblushing  "  scallawag,"  as  the  Southerners  call  political  renegades,  threw  his 
Democratic  sentiments  out  at  window,  and  went  in  for  the  Union  cause.  Of 
course  he  did  this  with  an  eye  to  future  plunder.  Mr.  Holden  was,  in  1873, 
Postmaster  at  the  State  Capitol,  and  seemed  but  little  affected  by  his  forcible 
removal  from  the  executive  chair. 

At  the  close  of  the  wild  carnival  of  robbery  and  maladministration  which 
marked  the  career  of  the  first  reconstruction  government,  North  Carolina  found 
that  her  debts  were  between  $36,000,000  and  $40,000,000.  This  was  an  appal- 
ling exhibit,  for  the  mere  payment  of  the  interest  was  enough  to  stagger  the 
impoverished  and  struggling  agriculturists.  The  money  had  gone,  alas !  none 
save  the  thieves  knew  where.  The  plundered  people  only  knew  that  out  of 
$16,000,000  voted  by  the  Legislatures  for  "public  works  of  improvements,"  but 
$500,000  had  ever  been  devoted  to  that  purpose;  and  the  ignorant  negro  himself 
was  puzzled  to  discover  what  had  become  of  the  resources  which,  at  the  outset 
of  his  political  career,  he  had  imagined  to  be  unfailing. 

The  main  villainies  had  been  consummated  at  a  time  when  the  mass  of  the 
white  natives  who  took  part  in  the  war  were  excluded  from  office,  and  when  the 
negro  vote  was  overwhelming.  As  soon  as  Governor  Holden  was  impeached, 
the  white  population  succeeded  in  gaining  a  fair  share  of  influence  again,  and 
when  he  was  removed  they  came  into  power,  Governor  Caldwell,  Holden's  suc- 
cessor, working  pretty  harmoniously  with  them.  The  political  troubles  may  now 
be  considered  as  nearly  over,  and  if  the  industrial  opportunities  of  the  State  are 
improved,  there  will  be  a  return  to  some  degree  of  prosperity.  Many  of  the 
most  influential  citizens  believe  that  an  attitude  of  perfect  frankness  on  the  part 
of  North  Carolina  toward  its  creditors  will  be  the  only  thing  that  can  save 
the  State.  They  are  anxious  to  see  a  compromise  effected  as  speedily  as  pos- 
sible, that  both  white  and  black  may  know  just  how  they  are"  situated,  and  may 
set  their  shoulders  to  the  wheel  in  earnest.* 

The  State- House  at  Raleigh  is  delightfully  situated  in  the  midst  of  lovely 
foliage,  and  its  massive  granite  columns  and  superb  dome,  modeled  after  the 
Parthenon,  are  very  imposing.  Raleigh  once  boasted  an  exquisite  statue  of 
Washington,  from  the  master  hand  of  Canova ;  but  it  was  destroyed  with  the 
first  State-House  in  the  disastrous  fire  in  1831.  The  town,  which  was  named  for 
Sir  Walter  Raleigh,  and  was  established  as  the  seat  of  government  in  1788,  is 
built  around  a  ten-acre  lot  called  Union  square,  in  the  centre  of  which  the  State- 
House  stands.  It  would  not  be  an  excess  of  generous  remembrance  on  the  part 
of  the  North  Carolinians  to  erect  in  their  capital  a  statue  of  the  illustrious  Essex, 
who  did  so  much  three  hundred  years  ago  to  further  the  colonization  of 
the  region  now  within  the  State's  limits.  At  Raleigh  there  is  a  large  and 
well-filled  Penitentiary,  and  the  Deaf  and  Dumb  and  Lunatic  Asylums  are 
situated  in  the  outskirts.  The  town  has  only  8,000  inhabitants,  half  of  whom 
are  negroes. 

*  This  chapter  was  written  in  the  summer  of  1874. 


47°  SHOCKING      ILLITERACY      IN      NORTH      CAROLINA. 

Northward  from  Raleigh,  toward  Charlotte,  lie  many  fertile  counties,  filled 
with  the  remnants  of  once  famous  plantations,  and  with  small  farms,  even  now 
prosperous.  At  Chapel  Hill  the  State  University,  now  much  fallen  into  decay, 
is  located ;  and  at  Hillsborough,  one  of  the  oldest  towns  in  the  State,  the  visitor 
is  still  shown  the  house  once  occupied  by  Lord  Cornwallis,  and  is  reminded 
that  Governor  Tryon  had  his  home  there ;  that  there  the  provincial  Congress 
and  the  Legislature  of  North  Carolina  first  assembled,  and  there,  too,  many 
unhappy  "  Regulators "  were  executed. 

The  State  certainly  needs  to  make  progress  in  education,  for  the  illiteracy  at 
present  within  its  borders  is  shocking.  One  of  the  United  States  Senators  gave 
it  me  his  belief  that  there  were  as  many  as  350,000  persons  in  North  Carolina 
who  could  neither  read  nor  write.  The  State  Superintendent  of  Instruction  said 
that,  late  in  1873,  there  were  only  150,000  out  of  the  350,000  pupil-children 
actually  at  school.  The  free  school  system,  he  thought,  up  to  that  date,  could 
by  no  means  be  called  a  thorough  success ;  coming,  as  it  did,  directly  after  the 
war,  when  people  were  striving  to  save  money  with  which  to  replace  their  lost 
stock  and  farming  implements,  the  dollar  tax  demanded  for  the  schools  was 
odious  to  the  masses.  Still,  from  $250,000  to  $400,000  is  annually  collected 
for  school  purposes ;  while  before  the  war  there  was  no  system  worthy  the  name. 
The  same  provision  is  made  for  whites  and  blacks ;  there  is  not  much  desire  on 
the  part  of  ex- Confederates  there  to  deprive  the  negro  of  the  advantages  of  an 
education,  as  they  now  realize  that  it  helps  him  to  become  a  better  laborer. 
There  are  40,000  colored  children  now 'in  the  free  schools  of  the  State;  530 
black  teachers  passed  the  Board  of  Examiners  in  1873,  and  these  teachers  were 
paid  $46,000  per  year.  There  are  several  small  colleges,  each  having  five  or 
six  score  students.  Prominent  among  them  are  Trinity,  at  Hyde  Point 
(Methodist),  Davidson,  at  old  Mecklenburg,  where  the  State  first  publicly 
renounced  her  allegiance  to  the  British  crown  (Presbyterian),  and  the  Wake 
Forest  (Baptist)  College,  near  Raleigh. 

The  school  law  of  the  State  requires  that  public  free  schools  shall  be  main- 
tained "four  months  every  year  in  every  school  district  in  each  county  of  the 
State  in  which  the  qualified  voters  shall  vote  to  levy  the  additional  school- tax 
for  that  purpose."  This,  of  course,  gives  people  an  opportunity  to  reject  the 
system  entirely,  but  there  are  few  counties  so  rude  as  to  refuse  all  educational 
facilities,  although  nearly  all  the  people  in  the  back-country  have  a  most  unac- 
countable aversion  to  paying  "school-taxes."  If  the  Legislature  would  inaugurate 
a  system  which  would  bring  the  people  up  to  its  level,  as  was  done  in  Virginia,  a 
reform  might  be  readily  effected.  Wilmington  has  at  last  made  the  free  schools 
which  have  long  existed  in  its  midst  city  institutions,  and  it  is  hoped  that  this 
good  example  will  be  followed  by  a  like  movement  in  all  the  large  towns. 
Raleigh,  strange  to  say,  is  hindered  from  taxing  itself  to  support  a  system  of 
graded  schools  by  the  State  law,  which  is  very  crotchety,  and  needs  amend- 
ment. The  Peabody  fund  distributes  $12,000  to  $13,000  annually  in  the 
State,  supporting  some  two  score  thriving  schools.  At  Newbern  and  Wash- 
ington the  citizens  have  shown  considerable  spirit  in  establishing  free  schools. 


WILMINGTON  —  THE      CAPE      FEAR      RIVER.  47 1 

The  capital  receives  35,000  or  40,000  bales  of  cotton  yearly,  but  the  great 
bulk  of  the  State's  crop  goes  by  Fail  to  Wilmington.  Edgecombe,  Caswell, 
Rockingham,  Stokes,, and  Warner  are  the  great  cotton  counties,  the  former  grow- 
ing 18,361  bales  in  1872.  The  cotton  production  of  the  State  varies  from 
100,000  to  150,000  bales  annually. 

The  range  of  climate  covered  by  the  State  may  be  taught  by  the  statement 
that  buckwheat  can  be  grown  on  the  mountains  in  Ashe  county,  and  oranges 
nourish  in  the  soft,  sweet  air  of  Wilmington.  There  is  a  tropical  luxuriance  of 
flowers  and  trees  in  Wilmington,  which  is  almost  astonishing,  for  one  sees  all 
plants  possible  at  Charleston  or  Savannah  flourishing  in  the  gardens  of  this  more 
northern  town.  Wilmington  lies  on  the  banks  of  the  Cape  Fear  river,  and  on 
the  hills  which  extend  backward  from  those  banks.  It  is  but  twenty-eight  miles 
from  the  mouth  of  the  river,  and  was  one  of  the  havens  most  sought  after  by 
blockade-runners  during  our  civil  war.  At  the  mouth  of  the  river  stand  Forts 
Fisher  and  Caswell,  the  former  one  of  the  strongest  forts  on  the  Atlantic  coast, 
as  it  proved  itself  in  the  terrible  days  of  1865,  when  Porter  and  Terry  knocked 
at  its  doors  and  finally  burst  them  open. 

Wilmington  has  important  railway  connections,  notably  the  Wilmington, 
Rutherford,  and  Charlotte  road,  which  will  give  the  port  direct  communication 
with  Tennessee,  Kentucky,  Ohio,  and  Illinois,  and  will  immensely  increase  her 
trade.  All  the  counties  through  which  the  road,  when  completed,  will  pass,  are 
rich  in  mineral  and  agricultural  resources.  The  other  routes  leading  to  Charles- 
ton and  Richmond  also  command  a  considerable  trade. 

The  Cape  Fear  river,  at  Wilmington,  is  a  wide  and  noble  stream,  and  the 
scene  along  its  banks,  in  the  brilliant  sunshine  of  the  autumn  morning  when  I 
saw  it,  was  inspiring.  Cheerful  gangs  of  negroes  were  rowing  huge  scows  from 
side  to  side  of  the  stream,  standing  upright  and  steering  by  means  of  long  poles 
or  sweeps  ;  one  might  have  fancied  them  a  species  of  African  gondoliers.  Swedish 
ships  were  loading  witlj  naval  stores ;  huge  piles  of  lumber,  and  heaps  and  long 
rows  of  barrels  of  turpentine,  and  pitch  and  rosin,  were  ranged  on  the  wharves. 
There  were  great  numbers  of  negroes  who  looked  idle,  although  many  were 
employed.  Some  were  fishing,  others  slept  in  corners;  one  or  two  groups 
seemed  discussing  politics,  and  in  the  centre  of  a  crowd  of  jet  black  men  I 
heard  the  following  question  and  answer,  isolated  fragments  of  a  deep  religious 
discussion  : 

"Wha's  de  reason  dar 's  so  many  degrees  (sects)  o'  Baptis'  now,  when  dar 
wa'n't  on'y  one  John  de  Baptis',  hey  ?  " 

"  Lor,  nigger,  we  ain't  'sponsible  fur  dat ;  dat  a'nt  got  nuffin  to  do  wid  godli- 
ness ! " 

Front  street  is  a  fine  avenue,  lined  with  many  elegant  blocks  devoted  to 
business.  Market  street  is  a  broad,  central  promenade,  crowded  with  the  omni- 
present negroes,  who  chatter  and  "  discuss  "  all  day  long.  The  blacks  seem  to 
fancy  that  labor  is  incompatible  with  the  enjoyment  of  a  city  life. 

In  that  portion  of  the  town  devoted  to  the  residences,  churches,  and  public 
buildings,  perfect  tranquillity  prevails.      Nowhere  is  there  hum  of  wheels,  clatter 


472 


THE     COMMERCE      OF     WILMINGTON. 


of  teams,  or  braying  of  whistles.  On  Third  and  Fifth  streets  there  are  many 
elegant  mansions,  and  gardens  filled  with  rarest  tropical  and  costly  plants.  The 
City  and  Thalian  halls,  the  jail,  and  one  or  two  of  the  churches  are  quite  impos- 
ing, but  the  city  is  not  rich  in  architecture.  The  cemeteries  are  pretty  sylvan 
retreats,  and  the  sleepy  moss-grown  suburb  of  "  Hilton  "  is  a  favorite  resort  for 
excursions. 

Commercially,  Wilmington  has  every  reason  to  hope  for  great  development. 
The  principal  articles  of  export  are  spirits  of  turpentine  in  barrels,  crude  turpen- 
tine, rosin,  tar,  pitch,  cotton,  peanuts,  and  lumber  in  all  shapes.*  The  foreign 
trade  is  mainly  with  Liverpool,  Queenstown,  Antwerp,  Belfast,  London,  Car- 
denas, Rotterdam,  Havana,  Bristol,  Hamburg,  Cape  Haytien,  Demerara,  Jamaica, 
Nassau  and  Hayti.  The  steamship  lines  running  to  Philadelphia,  Baltimore  and 
New  York,  have  an  aggregate  tonnage  of  40,000  tons  monthly.  In  1872, 
22,000,000  feet  of  lumber  were  shipped  from  the  port.  After  the  war,  the 
exports  of  spirits  of  turpentine  and  rosin  were  encouraging  until  1870;  since 
then  their  development  has  not  been  so  great,  but  the  constant  growth  of  the 
cotton  trade  makes  amends  for  their  failure.  The  fine  regions  extending  along 
the  road  to  Weldon,  and  on  both  sides  of  the  Wilmington,  Columbia  and 
Augusta  railroad,  as  well  as  on  the  new  Rutherford  route,  are  very  rich  in  tur- 
pentine and  timber.     The  section   traversed  by  the   two  Cape  Fears  and  the 

*  Comparative  statement  of  exports,  coastwise  and  foreign,  from  Wilmington,  North 
Carolina,  from  January  1,   i860,  to  December  31,    1870: 


Spirits  Turpentine,  bbls . 
Crude  Turpentine,  bbls. 

Rosin,  bbls 

Tar,  bbls 

Pitch,  bbls 

Cotton,  bales 

Cotton  Yarn,  bales 

Cotton  Sheeting,  bales.  . 

Peanuts,   bushels 

Lumber,  P.  P.,  feet 

Timber,  P.  P.,  feet 

Shingles 

Staves,  Cypress 

Staves,  Oak 


Coastwise. 


i860. 


127,562 

52,175 
440,132 

43,056 
5,489 

22,851 
1,561 
1,750 

99,743 
9,126,176 

22,600 
,  73o,88o 

94,723 


1870. 


68,966 

12,929 

483,546 

54,090 

4,624 

51,617 

72 

547 
124,296 

11,515-123 
290,789 

4,804,890 
482,253 


Foreign. 


20,400 

23,548 

57,425 

6,120 

784 


9,882,078 

20,000 

2,887,870 

I0,000 


1870. 


32,889 

3,258 

26,127 

6,107 

I90 

20 


8,378,861 
85,400 

2,339,334 


It  will  be  seen  by  the  above  that  the  export  of  naval  stores,  both  coastwise  and  foreign, 
except  in  one  instance,  has  fallen  off  greatly  during  the  past  decade,  while,  on  the  contrary, 
there  has  been  a  heavy  increase,  say  about  120  per  cent.,  in  the  shipments  of  cotton.  This  is 
due,  mainly,  to  the  fact  that  latterly,  and  in  the  country  supplying  the  city,  every  interest  was 
made  subservient  to  the  culture  of  cotton.  Even  the  production  of  turpentine  was  of  secondary 
importance  compared  with  the  zeal  with  which  cotton  was  planted,  so  that  Wilmington,  the 
greatest  naval  store  depot  in  the  world,  only  exported  coastwise  one  and  one-third  barrels  of 
spirits  turpentine  to  the  bale  of  cotton ;  that  is  to  say,  the  number  of  bales  of  cotton  exported 
was  seventy-five  per  cent,  of  the  number  of  barrels  of  spirits  turpentine. 


FAYETTEVILLE CHARLOTTE.  473 

South  and  Black  rivers  are,  perhaps,  richer  in  turpentine  stores  than  any  other  in 
the  world.  A  new  railway  line  on  the  lowlands  of  the  coast,  and  terminating 
at  Wilmington,  is  contemplated. 

The  little  city  has  a  valuation  of  only  $7,000,000,  a  debt  of  $600,000,  an 
excellent  city  government,  and  many  enterprising  merchants.  There  is  still 
some  bitterness  among  those  of  the  aristocrats  who  were  ruined  by  the  war,  but 
it  is  rapidly  mellowing  into  a  regret  which  has  but  little  of  unkindly  feeling 
toward  the  North  mingled  in  it.  A  determination  on  their  part  to  make  Wil- 
mington all  that  it  has  opportunities  to  be,  would  soon  increase  its  population 
from  14,000  to  many  times  that  number. 

Fayetteville  and  Charlotte  are  the  sites  of  prosperous  cotton  factories.  The 
water  power  of  the  former  place  has  never  been  utilized ;  and  it  is  astonishing 
that  it  is  not  taken  advantage  of.  Fayetteville  is  connected  by  rail  with  the 
mining  region  in  Chatham  and  Moore  counties,  and  is  on  the  line  of  one  of  the 
important  routes  to  the  South,  via  Columbia  and  Augusta.  Charlotte  bids  fair 
to  become  a  prominent  centre  for  manufacturing  interests,  on  account  of  its  rail- 
road facilities  and  fine  water  power.  Its  historic  importance,  as  the  place  where 
the  first  American  Declaration  of  Independence  was  made  in  1775,  by  the 
patriots  of  Mecklenburg  county,  assembled  in  convention,  cannot  be  denied. 
The  British  troops  occupied  Charlotte  in  1780;  and  there  it  was  that  General 
Greene  took  command  of  the  Southern  army,  after  the  departure  of  Cornwallis. 
The  United  States  Government  has  an  assay  office  at  Charlotte,  and  gold  mining 
is  from  time  to  time  carried  on  in  the  adjacent  counties.  The  town  also  boasts 
a  military  institute,  and  a  prosperous  seminary  for  young  ladies. 


A  Wayside  Sketch. 


LIV. 


AMONG     THE     SOUTHERN     MOUNTAINS — JOURNEY     FROM      EASTERN 
TENNESSEE     TO     WESTERN     NORTH     CAROLINA. 


"Y 


OU  ain't  a  show,  be  ye?"  said  the  small  boy. 

The  question  was  pardonable ;  the  travelers  alighting,  'that  rainy  June 
evening,  from  their  weary  and  mud-bespattered  horses  at  the  door  of  a  little 
tavern  in  a  Tennessee  mountain  town,  and  proceeding  to  unload  their  baggage- 
wagon,  certainly  presented  a  singular  spectacle.  Such  mysterious  array  of  traps 
the  small  boy's  round,  wondering  eyes  had  never  seen  before.      He  controlled  his 

curiosity  until  a  tin  case  containing 
artists'  materials  was  produced,  when  he 
gave  a  prolonged  whistle,  and  forthwith 
proceeded  to  inquire  our  qualities. 
Visions  of  magic  lanterns  and  traveling 
mountebanks  danced  before  his  eyes; 
his  heated  imagination  hinted  at  even 
the  possibility  of  play-actors. 

Two  days  of  swift  railway  travel  had 
brought  me  from  St.  Louis  to  join  a 
merry  party  of  excursionists  through 
the  noblest  mountain  ranges  of  the 
South.  We  had  come  from  Morris- 
town,  in  Eastern  Tennessee,  and  at  the 
end  of  our  first  day's  journey  on  horse- 
back, crawled,  drenched  and  fatigued, 
into  a  hamlet  for  shelter.  Let  me  show 
you  the  party  as  it  then  appeared. 

First  alighted   the  Colonel,   coming 
down  with  a  solid  thump  in  the  sticky 
mud,   and   unbuckling  from   his   saddle 
"The  smaii  p,oy."  capacious  bags    and    rolls  of  blankets ; 

then  taking  from  the  wagon  certain  mysterious   packages,  he  propounded  the 
inquiry  which  is  of  such  thrilling  interest  to  mountain  travelers  after  nightfall : 
"  Can  we  get  to  stay  here  to-night  ?" 
"  Reckon  we  can  accommodate  ye." 

Next  descended  the  Judge,  his  long,  gray  beard  and  Arabian  mustache 
streaming  with  rain,  his  garments  bedraggled,  and  his  eyes  dim  with  the  sky- 
spray.     He,  likewise  going  to  the  wagon,  took  from  it  seductive  valises,  boxes 


AMONG     THE      SOUTHERN      MOUNTAINS.  475 

which  gave  forth  a  cheering  rattle  of  apparatus,  and  cans  of  various  patterns,  and 
hastened  to  shelter.  A  new  accession  of  small  boys  silently  viewed  these  pro- 
ceedings with  awe. 

But  ah !  the  next  figure  which  galloped  lustily  to  the  door,  mounted  on  a 
prancing,  delicate  Kentucky  mare  !  How  did  the  juvenile  by-standers  gape  at 
that  short,  alert  youth,  with  spectacles  on  nose,  and  riding-whip  swung  cavalierly 
in  hand ;  with  white  Marseilles  trowsers  mottled  and  drenched  with  mud  and 
water;  with  jaunty  gray  hat,  flabby  and  drooping;  with  overcoat  tied  about  his 
neck,  and  a  collection  of  minerals  knotted  in  his  handkerchief  at  his  saddle-bow. 
He  was  no  common  traveler.     It  must — it  must  be  a  show  ! 

Or  he  with  camp  stool  and  dripping  umbrella  slung  on  his  shoulders,  with 
broad  slouch  hat  crushed  down  over  his  eyes,  and  a  variegated  panorama  of 
the  road  along  which  he  had  passed  painted  by  the  weather  upon  his  back — the 
artist,  whose  hands  were  filled  with  the  mystic  tin  box ;  behold  him !  the  envied 
cynosure  of  boyish  eyes. 

Then  the  writer, — clambering  down  from  his  horse's  smoking  sides,  and 
hastening  to  join  the  others  before  the  crackling  and  leaping  flame  in  an  old- 
fashioned  fire-place,  overhearing  as  he  entered,  however,  a  new  come  boy's  wild 
guess  : 

"If 't  ain't  a  show,  it  's  'rock-hunters,'  /reckon." 

What  mattered  rain  and  mud,  the  ferrying  of  swollen  streams,  the  breaking 
down  of  wagons,  and  the  weary  climbing  of  hills  ?  The  prospect  before  us  was 
none  the  less  inspiring.  We  were  about  to  enter  upon  that  vast  elevated  region 
which  forms  the  southern  division  of  the  Appalachian  mountain  system,  and 
constitutes  the  culminating  point  in  the  Atlantic  barrier  of  the  American  con- 
tinent. We  stood  at  the  gate  of  the  lands  through  which  runs  the  chain  of  the 
Iron,  Smoky,  and  Unaka  mountains,  separating  North  Carolina  from  Eastern 
Tennessee. 

Beyond  the  blue  line  of  hills  faintly  discerned  in  the  rainy  twilight  from  the 
windows  of  our  little  room  lay  the  grand  table-land,  2,000  feet  above  the  heated 
air  of  cities  and  the  contagion  of  civilization ;  and  there  a  score  of  mountain 
peaks  reached  up  6,000  feet  into  the  costal  atmosphere  ;  torrents  ran  impetuously 
down  their  steep  sides  into  noble  valleys ;  there  was  the  solitude  of  the  canon,  the 
charm  of  the  dizzy  climb  along  the  precipice-brink,  the  shade  of  the  forests 
where  no  woodman's  axe  had  yet  profaned  the  thickets.  It  was  a  region 
compared  to  which  the  White  mountains  seemed  dwarfed  and  insignificant,  for 
through  an  extent  of  more  than  150  miles,  height  after  height  towered  in  solemn 
magnificence,  and  the  very  valleys  were  higher  up  than  the  gaps  in  the  White 
mountain  range  !  Through  the  thick  rain-veil,  during  our  first  day's  wandering, 
we  had  seen  the  noble  outlines  of  English  mountain,  and  the  distant  and  rugged 
sides  of  the  Smoky ;  had  passed  over  hill- sides  covered  with  corn,  where  the 
white  tree-trunks  in  the  "deadenings"  stood  like  spectres  protesting  against 
sacrilege  ;  along  banks  of  streams  overhung  with  dense  and  richly-colored  foliage, 
and  past  log  farm-houses,  where  tall,  gaunt  farmers,  clad  in  homespun,  were 
patiently   waiting   for   the   rain    to   cease — until  we  came   to  the    "  Mouth  of 


476 


FROM 


NOLICHUCKY 


TO     PIGEON      RIVER. 


Chucky,v   as  the   ford  just  above  the   junction  of  the  Nolichucky  and  French 
Broad  rivers  is  called. 

Time  was  when  all  the  country  bordering  the  rivers  at  their  junction  was 
romantic  ground.  The  "  great  Indian  war  trail,"  upon  which  so  many  scenes 
of  violence  and  murder  were  enacted,  ran  not  far  from  the  banks  of  the  No- 
lichucky, and  the  war-ford  "  upon  the  French  Broad  "  was  but  a  short  distance 
from  Clifton,  where  we  had  halted  for  the  night.  From  the  time  of  the  settlement 
along  the  banks  of  the  two  rivers,  one  hundred  years  ago,  until  early  in  the 
present  century,  the  settler  took  his  life  in  his  hands  daily,  and  the  war-cry 
of  the  Indian  was  a  familiar  sound  to  his  ears. 

The  Nolichucky,  at  the  ford,  ran  rapidly  between  great  mountain  banks, 
whose  sides  were  so  steep  as  to  be  inaccessible  on  foot,  and  just  below  gave 
itself  to  the  racing  and  roaring  rapids  of  the  "  French  Broad,"  which  seemed 
angry  at  being  pent  up  among  the  cliffs.  A  long  halloo  brought  the  ferry- 
man with  his  flat-boat  from  the  opposite  bank;  the  clumsy  ark  drifting  us 
safely  over  to  the  stretch  of  winding  road  which  finally  led  us  through  a  still 
old  town,  hidden  and  moldering  at  the  base  of  a  hill,  whence  we  followed 
along  picturesque  paths  until  we  reached  the  placid  Pigeon  river,  with  the 
mountains  near  it  mirrored  in  its  bosom,  and,  crossing  it,  dismounted  at  Clif- 
ton, to  be  confronted  by  the  small  boy  with  the  abnormal  appetite  for 
"  shows." 

The  rain  ceased  when  we  were  safely  housed ;  and  having  placed  our 
drenched  garments  by  the  fire  to  dry,  we  waited  for  the  supper  of  bacon  and 

biscuits,  flanked  by  molasses-syrup  and 
the  blackest  of  coffee,  meanwhile  catch- 
ing a  glimpse  of  the  prosperous  little 
town  set  down  in  a  nook  in  the  mount- 
ains, with  a  single  railroad  line,  run- 
ning directly  through  the  main  street, 
giving  it  a  hold  on  the  outer  world. 
The  river  was  fringed  with  trees  and 
overhanging  vines  and  creepers ;  in 
every  direction  was  the  blue  stretch 
of  far-away  hills,  or  the  shadow  of  lux- 
uriant woods.  Our  lullaby  that  night 
was  the  murmur  of  the  river  and  the 
cry  of  the  whip-poor-will.  Before  dawn 
we  were  astir,  and  while  the  dwellers 
in  cities  were  still  asleep  our  little  caval- 
cade was  vigorously  en  route  for  the 
North  Carolina  line. 
Ahead,  caracoling  merrily  from  side  to  side  of  the  highway  on  his  coquet- 
tishly-pacing  mare  "  Cricket,"  whose  very  motions  were  poetry,  rode  Jonas  of 
the  blond  locks,  our  German  companion,  in  his  saddle  graceful  as  a  Centaur, 
in  his  motions  alert  as  a  cat,  for  he  had  ridden  to  many  a  battle  in  the  cav- 


'The  Judge."     [Page  473.] 


A     MOUNTAIN      PANORAMA — A     TENNESSEE     CABIN.  477 

airy  of  Prussian  William's  victorious  army.  There  was  a  dash  of  the  trooper 
in  him  still — the  erect  military  port,  the  joyous  outburst  into  song,  now 
roystering,  now  tender ;  the  enviable  familiarity  with  all  the  secrets  of  road 
and  woodland  life,  and  a  calm,  aesthetic  sense,  never  disturbed  by  weather 
or  the  rude  inconvenience  of  travel. 

Our  route  that  morning  lay  through  the  forest,  along  unused  road- ways;  and, 
constantly  ascending,  we  caught  from  time  to  time  exquisite  views  of  the  sum- 
mits of  English,  the  Smoky,  and  other  mountains.  Great  mists  were  moving 
lightly  away ;  now  and  then  some  monarch  of  the  ranges  had  his  lofty  brow 
wrapped  in  the  delicate  embrace  of  white  clouds,  which  spread  into  fantastic 
shapes  of  smoke-wreaths  and  castles  and  towers,  sometimes  even  seeming  to 
take  the  contour  of  the  mountains  themselves. 

Now  we  came  to  a  log-house,  with  sloping  roof,  set  on  some  shelf  of  a  hill- 
side, whence  one  could  look  down  into  deep  valleys,  and  around  whose  doors 
sheep  and  goats  were  huddled,  lying  in  the  shelter  of  the  fences  until  the  sun 
came  out.  A  shepherd  dog  would  bark  at  us ;  a  tall  maiden,'  clad  in  the  blue  or 
greenish  homespun  of  the  region,  would  tell  us  which  road  to  take,  and  how  to 
turn  and  "foller  the  creek,"  and  so  we  wandered  on.  Sometimes  the  hill-sides 
were  so  steep  that  we  preferred  to  dismount  and  lead  our  horses  rather  than  take 
the  risk  of  being  pitched  over  their  heads.  Rapid  little  streams  here  and  there 
foamed  across  the  roadways,  and  hid  themselves  in  the  forests. 

Beneath  a  great  oak,  or  wide-spreading  willow,  we  found  a  cool  spring  with  a 
gourd  upon  a  board  above  it,  and  travelers  halting  for  shade  and  rest,  with  whom 
our  party  would  exchange  courtesies  and  interrogatories.  Still  we  went  on 
climbing  up  and  up  —  nearer  to  some  of  the  peaks,  and  within  view  of  the  clear- 
ings upon  their  sides,  and  the  bald  patches  where  the  rocks  stood  out  in  the 
light. 

By  and  by,  at  a  lonely  log-house,  on  a  beautiful  mountain  side,  whence  one 
could  see  the  hills  craning  their  long  necks  in  every  direction,  we  halted  for  din- 
ner; but  before  we  had  hitched  our  horses  there  came  a  sudden  blinding  storm 
of  wind  and  rain,  in  the  midst  of  which  we  hurriedly  gave  the  animals  over  to  our 
impervious  mulatto  wagon-driver,  and  with  the  lunch  baskets  beat  a  retreat  for 
the  cabin  porch. 

The  typical  Tennessee  woman  of  the  mountains,  tall  and  thin,  but  kind  and 
graceful,  the  mother  of  ten  children,  who  stood  ranged  around  her  in  inquiring 
attitude,  welcomed  us,  and  a  loaf  of  hot  corn-bread  soon  smoked  upon  the  table. 
Very  humble  and  simple  were  the  appointments  of  this  cabin  home.  The  bare 
floor,  however,  was  extremely  clean ;  the  spinning-wheel,  with  the  flax  hanging 
to  it,  stood  in  a  corner  of  the  porch ;  in  the  great  kitchen  in  the  rear  of  the  cabin 
was  a  fire-place,  in  the  ashes  of  which  another  corn-cake  was  baking,  and  the 
good  woman  offered  us  wild  honey,  buttermilk,  and  the  berries  of  the  mountains. 

"No  man-folks  nigh  home  now,"  she  said.     "Air  you  rock-huntin'  ?" 

Assuring  her  that  we  were  not  looking  for  minerals,  she  questioned  us  no  far- 
ther, and  seemed  to  be  puzzled  when  the  Colonel  hinted  that  we  were  in  "search 
of  information." 

31 


478  MISTAKEN     FOR     REVENUE     OFFICERS. 

Once  more  the  rain- cloud  lifted  and  the  skies  were  clear.  Andy  hitched  up, , 
singing  a  cheerful  melody,  and  we  rode  on ;  now  through  gaps  in  the  chain  of 
hills  where  level  fields  were  in  cultivation,  and  where  the  women  were  at  work 
side  by  side  with  the  men  hoeing  corn ;  now  by  the  banks  of  some  creek  which 
rippled  merrily  over  a  pebbly  bottom,  and  was  overhung  by  short,  densely-set 
willows;  until,  at  last,  we  came  into  a  valley  where  there  were  a  few  scattered 
frame  houses  and  a  little  mill,  around  which  were  gathered  some  twenty  mount- 
aineers. Here  our  over-loaded  wagon  suddenly  broke  down,  directly  opposite 
a  cabin,  in  which,  through  the  interstices,  we  could  see  anvil,  bellows,  and  other 
appurtenances  of  the  blacksmith's  trade. 

The  afternoon  was  waning,  and  the  punctual  Judge  had  planned  that  we 
should  spend  that  night  in  North  Carolina.  But  before  us  lay  a  tremendous 
height,  whose  rugged  sides  seemed  interminable.  Riding  on  in  haste  to  find  the 
blacksmith,  we  were  suddenly  surrounded  by  a  threatening  mob  of  half-drunken 
mountain  men  clad  in  rude  garb,  some  mounted,  some  on  foot,  but  not  one  of 
them  with  a  friendly  look.  Our  inquiry  for  help,  as  Jonas  and  the  writer  backed 
their  horses  rapidly,  was  met  with  an  oath,  and  a  peremptory  demand  why  we 
were  "racketing  about  the  country." 

This  not  being  answered  in  the  most  satisfactory  manner,  demonstrations  of 
violence  were  made,  and  it  dawned  upon  the  advance  guard  of  the  wagon  that 
perhaps  a  retreat  would  be  prudent.  There  were  bad  and  drunken  faces  among 
the  rough  men ;  two  or  three  hands  were  clutching  stones  plucked  from  the  wet 
roads,  while  the  circle  gradually  narrowed  in  toward  us.  So  galloping  back,  we 
reported  "breakers  ahead."  Patching  up  the  wagon  we  all  moved  forward 
together;  but  upon  our  approach  to  the  mill  the  threatening  attitude  of  the 
mountaineers  was  resumed,  the  motley  crowd  falling  in  behind  when  we  had 
passed,  and  seeming  to  await  some  signal.  Presently  the  Colonel  and  the  Judge 
were  assailed  with  questions  like  this  from  the  pursuing  group :  "  Reckon  ye 
don't  want  to  steal  nothin',  do  ye?"  This  being  succeeded  by  more  pointed 
remarks. 

At  last  hostilities  became  so  imminent  that  we  were  forced  to  stop  and 
explain.  Gathering  around  the  wagon,  we  answered  the  inquiries,  "Whar 
be  ye  from?"  "What  do  ye  want  yer?"  "What  mout  your  name  be?" 
etc.,  and  by  much  parleying  demonstrated  that  we  meant  no  harm.  Finally 
man  by  man  dropped  off,  but,  much  to  our  discomfort,  two  or  three  of  the  more 
drunk  and  uproarious  followed  us  toward  the  ford  at  the  base  of  the  mountain 
in  a  manner  which  plainly  indicated  attack. 

We  were  now  entering  upon  a  wild  and  lonely  by-road,  and  even  the  here- 
tofore incredulous  of  our  party  had  suspicions  of  mischief  afoot.  The  ascent, 
wooded  and  sombre,  was  before  us. 

At  this  juncture  another  man  approached,  and  said  he  would  walk  with  us  to 
the  mountain  top.  He  was  sober,  and,  producing  from  his  pocket  a  flask  of 
"moonshine"  whiskey,  invited  us  to  drink.  The  secret  was  out.  We  had  evi- 
dently been  mistaken  for  a  party  of  revenue  officers,  on  a  mission  to  seize  some 
of  the  concealed  stills  in  the  gorges  and -Caves  of  this  wild  region. 


CHESTNUT      MOUNTAIN PARSON      CATON'S. 


479 


We  drank  of  the  blistering  fluid,  and  presently,  to  our  great  relief,  the 
drunken  horsemen  behind  reluctantly  retired.  After  consulting  vaguely  together 
for  a  little  time  in  the  road,  they  disappeared,  our  companion  assuring  us  that 
they  would  do  us  no  harm.  "  But  ye  can't  always  tell,"  he  added.  "  A  man 
wants  to  keep  his  eye  out  in  these  regions  when  the  boys  've  ben  drinkin'. " 

The  ascent  of  the  Chestnut  mountain  now  became  tedious  and  painful.  The 
road  ran  zigzag  along  the  edges  of  banks  and  rocks,  and  over  our  heads  hung 
mammoth  embankments,  which  might  have  crushed  a  caravan.  But  how  deli- 
cious the  sunlight  on  the  tree-stems,  through  the  forest  glades ;  how  delicate  the 
green  mosses  clothing  the  trunks  of  fallen  monarchs ;  how  crystal  and  sweet  the 
water  which  we  drank  from  the  foamy  brooks  ! 

For  miles  we  clambered  along  this  lofty  read  until  night  was  at  hand.  Our 
companion,  who  paused  from  time  to  time  to  treat  himself  from  the  bottle,  and 
to  importune  us  to  drink,  finally  left  us  at  a  cross-road,  advising  us  to  stay  at 
Parson  Caton's.  We  could  get  to  stay  with  the  parson — he  kept  folks ;  would 
we  have  some  more  "moonshine?"  No?  Good  luck  to  us.  So  we  hurried  on 
to  Parson  Caton's. 

A  by-road,  leading  into  a  thicket  where  wild  vines  grew  luxuriantly ;  steep 
descents  and  lofty  knolls,  crowned  with  strong  tree-stems;  a  woodland  path; 
then  a  clearing,  and  we  were  at  the  humble  cabin  of  the  parson. 


«zfJ2avrj/%o~- 


The  Judge  shows  the  Artist's  Sketch-Book. 


LV. 

ACROSS     THE     "SMOKY"     TO     WAYNESVILLE — THE     MASTER     CHAIN 

OF     THE     ALLEGHANIES. 

ON  our  way  up  the  mountain  we  had  passed  "the  church."  It  was  a  rude 
structure  of  boards  and  logs,  which  we  should  have  mistaken  for  some 
deserted  shanty,  had  not  our  friend  of  the  "moonshine"  whiskey  pointed  it  out. 

The  parson's  cabin  stood  in  an  enclosure,  guarded  by  a  rough  fence,  and,  as 
we  approached,  a  stalwart  young  fellow  opened  the  little  gate,  and  some  hounds 
followed  him  out,  making  the  woods  ring  with  their  yelping.  A  tall  matron  and 
two  of  "  the  girls  " — young  women,  at  least  five  and  a-half  feet  high,  dressed 
in  straight,  homespun  gowns — peered  out  at  us,  and  we  were  presently  invited 
to  remain  at  the  cabin  all  night,  as  "  the  parson  never  refuses  nobody." 

The  pigs  and  the  geese  had  just  come  home  together  from  their  day's  ramble 
in  the  woods,  and  were  quarreling  over  the  trough  which  ran  along  the  fence. 
The  cows  wandered  about  the  clearing,  watched  by  the  hounds ;  and  the  "boys" 
busied  themselves  in  hewing  logs  of  wood  into  sticks  for  the  fire.  Behind  the  cabin 
rose  a  rib  of  the  mountain,  on  which  was  a  corn-field,  and  near  this  ran  a  brook. 

The  whole  cabin  did  not  seem  large  enough  to  house  a  family  of  four;  yet 
Parson  Caton's  stalwart  brood  of  ten  children  lived  there  happily  with  himself 
and  wife,  and  found  the  shelter  ample.  There  were  but  two  rooms  on  the  lower 
floor,  each  lighted  by  the  doors  only ;  above  was  a  loft,  in  which  were  laid 
truckle-beds.  Supper  was  speedily  cooking  on  the  coals  in  the  fire-place ;  the 
scent  of  bacon  was  omnipresent.  In  the  smaller  of  the  two  rooms  there  were  four 
large  beds,  covered  with  gay  quilts,  and  shoved  closely  together.  Around  the 
room  hung  collections  of  herbs  and  several  rifles ;  for  furniture  there  were  a  few 
rude  chairs,  and  a  small  table,  on  which  were  some  antiquated  books. 

As  we  returned  from  a  wash  at  the  brook  the  parson  came  home,  and  was 
greeted  with  a  cheery  welcome  from  the  hounds.  Every  inch  of  his  face  was 
filled  with  rugged  lines,  which  told  of  strong  character.  He  stood  leaning  on  his 
staff  and  looking  us  over  intently  for  some  moments  before  he  said,  "  Good 
evening,  men."  Then  he  greeted  us  heartily,  and  our  invalid  wagon  was  forth- 
with dispatched  to  the  rustic  forge  near  the  cabin  for  repairs.  There  Andy  held 
a  pine  knot,  while  the  parson's  son,  a  stout  smith,  worked. 

This  old  man,  in  his  mountain  home,  was  as  simple  and  courteous  in  his 
demeanor  as  any  citizen.  After  the  frugal  supper  was  over,  he  asked  us  many 
questions  of  the  outer  world,  which  he  had  never  visited  ;  New  York  and  Louis- 
ville seemed  to  him  like  dreams.  By  and  by  the  family  came  crowding  in  to 
evening  prayers.     It  was  quite  dark,  and  the  forest  around  us  was  still. 


A     TENNESSEE      PARSON'S      HOME. 


48I 


The  parson  took  down  a  well-worn  Bible,  and  opening  it  at  the  Psalms,  read, 
in  a  loud  voice,  and  with  occasional  quaint  expoundings,  one  or  two  selections ; 
after  which,  taking  up  a  hymn-book,  he  read  a  hymn,  and  the  family  sang  line  by 
line  as  he  gave  them  out.  They  sung  in  quavering,  high-pitched  voices,  to  the 
same  tunes  which  were  heard  in  the  Tennessee  mountains  when  Nolichucky  was 
an  infant  settlement,  and  the  banks  of  the  French  Broad  were  crimsoned  with  the 
blood  of  white  settlers,  shed  by  the  Indians. 

The  echoes  of  the  hymn  died  away  into  the  depths  of  the  forest,  and  were 
succeeded  by  a  prayer  of  earnestness  and  fervor,  marked  here  and  there  by 
strong  phrases  of  dialect,  but  one  which  made  our  little  company  bow  their  heads, 
for  the  parson  prayed#for  us  and  for  our  journey,  and  brought  the  prayer  home 


HP 


P,0K/|i 


"The  family  sang  line  by  line." 

to  us.  Another  hymn  was  lined,  during  which  the  hounds  now  and  then  joined 
in  with  their  musical  howls,  and  at  last  the  family  withdrew,  leaving  us  in  the 
spare-room.  Presently,  however,  the  parson  reappeared,  and  announced  that  he 
and  his  wife  would  share  the  room  with  us,  which  they  did ;  and  we  were 
wakened  to  the  six  o'clock  breakfast  by  the  good  woman,  who  joined  with  her 
husband  in  reproving  us  for  continuing  our  journey  on  the  Sabbath  day. 

As  we  started  once  more,  the  wagon,  carefully  mended  overnight,  broke 
down  again  !  So  then  the  parson  stripped  a  hickory  bough  with  his  own  hands, 
and  bound  together  the  pieces.  A  mile  farther  on,  coming  to  another  forge,-  we 
halted  until  a  second  smith  tried  his  hand  at  a  permanent  mending,  although  he 
said  he  "  mout  get  fined  by  the  authorities  for  working  on  a  Sunday."     The 


482 


ENTERING     THE      NORTH      CAROLINA      MOUNTAINS. 


Judge  amused  the  smith's  children  with  the  artist's  sketch-book,  while  the  ham- 
mer rang  on  the  anvil. 

The  country  here  and  henceforward  was  of  the  wildest  and  most  romantic 
character.     The  mountaineers,  scattered  sparsely  along  the  ridges,  cultivated  the 

land  in  corn,  of  which  there  were  huge  fields 
visible  in  the  clearings,  but  sent  nothing  to 
market  in  winter,  and,  while  the  crops  were 
growing,  were  idle.  The  houses  were  almost 
invariably  of  logs.  Often,  as  in  Switzerland, 
looking  down  a  high  bank,  we  could  see  the 
tree -tops  in  a  long  valiey  below  us,  and  the 
cabin  of  some  farmer,  with  his  cob -house 
granary  and  little  cattle-pen  nestling  by  a 
creek.  Here,  by  the  hard,  firm  roadways,  the 
mountain  laurel,  the  ginseng  and  the  gentian 
abounded,  and  pines  and  spruces,  poplars, 
hickories,  walnuts,  oaks,  and  ash  grew  in  the 
valleys  and  along  the  banks. 

We  were  now  climbing  over  the  hills  of  the 
Great  Smoky  range,  making  our  way  toward 
the  elevated  gap,  through  which,  we  were  to 
enter  North  Carolina.  Every  turn  in  the 
angular  highway  brought  a  new  vista  of 
mountains,  blue  and  infinite,  behind  us ;  now 
in  serrated  ranks,  receding  into  distance ;  now  seeming  to  close  up  near  at 
hand,  and  shut  out  the  world  from  us.  The  rare  atmosphere  of  these  high 
regions  gave  new  zest  to  the  journey,  and  we  hardly  knew  that  evening  was  at 
hand  when  we  reached  the  State  line  and  began  to  descend  into  the  valley  to 
"  Hopkins's,"  the  first  station  in  North  Carolina. 

In  this  remote  and  mountain- guarded  dell, — this  cup  hollowed  out  of  the 
Great  Smoky  range,  visited  only  by  the  post  -  rider  once  a  week,  and  the  few 
farmers  who  go  to  the  far  towns  of  Eastern  Tennessee  to  market, —  we  found  the 
mountaineer  in  his  native  purity.  No  contact  with  even  the  people  of  the  low- 
lands of  his  own  State  had  given  him  familiarity  with  the  world. 

The  people  whom  Ave  passed  as  we  rode  on  to  Hopkins's,  traveling  along 
the  roads  out  of  Tennessee  into  North  Carolina,  were  tall  and  robust;  their 
language  was  peculiar,  and  their  manners,  although  courteous,  were  awkward  and 
rough.  The  gaunt,  yellow-haired  women  were  smoking,  and  trudged  along  con- 
tentedly beside  the  men,  saying  but  little.  They  were  neatly  dressed  in  home- 
made clothes,  and  their  hair  was  combed  straight  down  over  their  cheeks  and 
knotted  into  "pugs  "behind.  There  were  none  of  the  modern  conventionalities 
of  dress  visible  about  them.  The  men  were  cavalier  enough ;  their  jean  trow- 
sers  were  thrust  into  their  boots,  and  their  slouch  hats  cocked  on  their  heads  with 
bravado  air.  The  hills  rose  high  up  around  the  humble  log- dwelling  of 
Hopkins,  and  a  little  road  ran  beside  a  roaring  torrent  which  came  down  from 


A  Mountain  Farmer. 


hopkins's  —  mount    starling — among    the    peaks. 


483 


the   mountain  through  a  delicious   valley,  making   charming   nooks    and    niches 
among  the   round   polished   stones. 

Once  a  prosperous  farmer,  the  war  had  left  the  venerable  mountaineer  only 
the  wrecks  of  his  home.  Both  parties  had  guerrillaed  through  the  gorges  and 
gaps;  one  "army"  burned  Hopkins's  cabin,  and  the  other  stole  his  produce. 
High  on  the  hill-sides  grew. the  native  grape;  a  little  cultivation  would  have 
turned  the  whole  valley- cup  into  a  fruitful  vineyard ;  but  Hopkins  said  it  was  too 
late  for  him  to  try.  It  was,  too,  an  excellent  sheep-grazing  country ;  the  wolves 
sometimes  made  cruel  havoc,  but  shepherd-dogs  could  easily  keep  them  off. 
Along  the  slopes  of  the  Smoky  beyond  his  home  grew  the  finest  of  building 
timber,  and  water  power  was  abundant;  yet  there  were  no  frame  houses  for 
miles  around. 

"  Wal,  you  uns  don't  understand,  I  reckon,"  said  Hopkins.  "  I  hain't  had  a 
mighty  sight  o'  git  up  since  the  war." 

Supper  was  served  in  the  kitchen  by  one  of  the  tall  females  we  had  observed 
upon  the  road,  who  was  Hopkins's  housekeeper,  and  who  laid  aside  her  pipe  to 
come  to  the  table  and  wait  upon  the  strangers,  whom,  she  said,  she  did  not 
understand,  "for  you  uns  don't  talk  like  we  uns;"  adding  that  she  "reckoned  we 
found  this  a  mighty  fine  country." 

Half  a  day's  journey  from  this  nook  in  the  mountains  brought  us  to  the  gap 
near  Mount  Starling,  where  we  crossed  through  the  Smoky  range,  and  began  to 
descend  on  the  other  side  into  Haywood  county,  a  division  of  North  Carolina, 
extending  over  750  square  miles,  and  annually  producing  more  than  200,000 
bushels  of  corn.  The  chain  of  the  Smoky  mountain  which  we  had  traversed 
extends  for  about  sixty-five  miles,  from  the  deep 
gorge  through  which  the  French  Broad  river  flows 
at  "Paint  Rock"  to  the  outlet  of  the  Little  Ten- 
nessee ;  and  Professor  Guyot,  who  is  authority  upon 
the  Appalachian  system,  calls  it  the  master  chain 
of  the  whole  Alleghany  region. 

The  dominant  peaks  in  this  line  of  mountains 
north  of  Road  Gap  are  Mount  Guyot,  6,636  feet 
high  ;  Mounts  Alexander,  Henry,  South,  and  Laurel 
Peaks,  the  True  Brother,  Thunder,  Thermometer, 
Raven's,  and  Tricolor  Knobs,  and  the  Pillar  Head 
of  the  straight  fork  of  the  Oconaluftee  river.  South 
of  Road  Gap  rise  the  peaks  known  as  "  Clingman's 
Dome,"  6,660  feet  high  ;  Mounts  Buckley,  Love, 
Collins,  and  a  dozen  others,  more  than  5,000  feet  high. 

Each  of  these  rises  to  6,000  feet  elevation  above 
mean-tide  water,  and  many  of  them  overtop  Mount 
Washington,  the  monarch  of  the  East,  by  several 
hundred  feet.  Seen  from  a  distance,  these  mount- 
ains seem  always  bathed  in  a  mellow  haze,  like  that  distinguishing  the  atmos- 
phere of  Indian  summer.      The  gap  through  which  we  passed  was  at  an  elevation 


'We  caught  a  glimpse  of  the  symmetrical 
Catalouche  mountain."     [Page  484.] 


4§4 


CATALOUCHE      MOUNTAIN HIGH      PEAKS. 


of  at    least    5,000   feet;  beneath    us    were  vast    canons,  from  which    came    up 
the  roar  of  the  creeks. 

We  looked  down  upon  the  tops  of  mighty  forests,  and  now  and  then,  descend- 
ing, caught  a  glimpse  of  the  symmetrical  Catalouche  mountain,  fading  away  into 
distant  blue.  There  are  no  gaps  in  the  Smoky  range  which  fall  below  the  level 
of  5,000  feet,  until  Forney  Ridge  is  passed;  and  there  is  a  surprising  number  of 
peaks  and  domes  rising  higher  than  6,000  feet. 


Th«  Canon  of  the  Catalouche  as  seen  from  "Bennett's."     [Page  485 


Once  having  traversed  the  barriers  created  by  this  vast  upheaval,  one  enters 
the  mountainous  region  comprised  between  the  Blue  Ridge  and  the  chain  of  the 
Iron,  Smoky,  and  Unaka  peaks.  This  region  properly  begins  at  the  bifurcation 
of  the  two  chains  in  Virginia,  and  extends  across  North  Carolina  and  into 
Georgia  for  108  miles.  The  chain  of  the  Blue  Ridge  to  the  eastward  is  frag- 
mentary, and  the  gaps  are  only  from  2,000  to  3,000  feet  high.     All  the  interior 


THE     CANON     OF     THE      CATALOUCHE.  485 

region  between  the  Blue  Ridge  and  the  Smoky  is  filled  with  spurs  and  chains,  of 
which,  perhaps,  the  most  noticeable  is  the  great  Balsam,  whose  highest  point, 
called  the  Richland  Balsam,  or  Caney  Creek  Balsam  Divide,  reaches  the  height 
of  6,425  feet.  Into  this  cluster  of  highlands,  extending  to  the  extreme  western 
boundary  of  North  Carolina,  we  now  daily  made  our  way. 

This  day's  journey  was  but  a  succession  of  grand  panoramic  views  of  gorge 
and  height.  Descending,  we  rode  for  several  miles  along  a  path  cut  out  of  the 
mountain's  steep  side ;  and  hundreds  of  feet  below  us  saw  the  tops  of  tall  pines 
and  spruces.  Not  a  human  habitation  was  to  be  seen  ;  there  was  no  sign  of  life 
save  when  a  ruffled  grouse  or  a  rabbit  sprang  across  the  track. 

Now  we  came  into  a  valley,  through  which  a  wide  creek  flowed  rapidly, 
finding  its  outlet  between  two  hills  towering  thousands  of  feet  above  us,  and 
there,  at  a  rude  cabin,  stopped  to  feed  our  weary  horses,  and  to  partake  of  the 
milk,  the  honey,  and  the  corn-bread  set  before  us ;  to  lie  on  the  turf  beside  the 
cool  stream,  and  to  drink  in  at  every  pore  the  delicious  inspiration  of  the  pure 
mountain  air.  Remounting,  we  climbed  along  the  side  of  shaggy  "  Catalouche," 
until,  late  in  the  afternoon,  we  came  to  "Bennett's." 

Imagine  a  little  frame  house  set  on  a  shelf  on  the  road,  so  that  its  inmates  can 
look  for  miles  down  a  deep  straight  valley,  through  which  flows  a  river  between 
banks  fringed  with  dense  foliage,  and  by  rocks  over  which  pines  lean  and 
straggle  in  wildest  confusion.  At  the  far  end  of  this  river  valley  looms  up  a  tall 
mountain  peak,  so  beautiful  that  one's  soul  is  lifted  at  very  sight  of  it.  As  our 
little  company  drew  rein  at  the  edge  of  the  steep  bank  leading  to  the  canon, 
there  was  a  universal  cry  of  delight.  Bennett's  folks  called  to  us  at  that  moment, 
"Won't  you  'light,'  strangers,  'n  come  in?"  We  sat  long  in  the  little  porch, 
gazing  at  Oconoluftee's  height,  and  the  Balsam  mountains,  dimly  shadowed 
beyond  the  point  where  the  valley  was  lost  in  the  breast  of  the  hills.  The 
grandeur  of  the  sentinel  mountain,  standing  alone  at  the  end  of  the  chasm ;  the 
reflections  of  high  rocks  and  mighty  tree-trunks  in  the  far-away  stream ;  the 
dizzy  precipices  which  overhung  the  rarely  frequented  valley,  lent  a  charm  which 
carried  its  terror  with  it. 

The  road  grew  narrower  and  rockier  as  we  clambered  along  Catalouche ;  but 
the  air  was  cooler,  purer,  the  laurels  more  abundant,  the  vistas  more  charming ; 
until  just  at  sunset  we  came  to  the  "Cove  Creek  Gap."  In  front  lay  a  narrow 
valley,  over  which  the  mountain  known  as  Jonathan's  Bald  threw  his  shadow ; 
but  beyond  ! — 

High  on  the  horizon  lay  a  wavy  line  of  hills,  sharply  outlined  in  the  strong 
glare  of  the  sunset,  their  delicate  blue .  colors  springing  so  suddenly  upon  our 
vision  against  the  purple  and  crimson  of  the  evening  tints  that  we  were  surprised 
and  delighted.  As  far  as  eye  could  reach,  to  right,  to  left,  in  front,  stood  the 
long  line  of  uplifted  crags,  from  which  there  seemed  no  outlet !  Turning  our 
horses  on  the  crest  of  the  mountain,  and  looking  Tennesseeward,  we  saw  our  old 
friends  of  the  Great  Smoky,  scattered  for  miles  in  friendly  groups  among  the 
dark  forests ;  westward  and  eastward  deep  ravines,  and,  beyond  them,  uncounted 
peaks,  which  the  very  sky  seemed  tenderly  to  bend  over  and  kiss. 


486 


JONATHAN'S     CREEK     VALLEY WAYNESVILLE, 


It  was  fast  growing  dark  as  we  rode  on  to  the  winding  road  in  the  valley  of 
Jonathan's  creek.  As  we  were  rattling  by  a  log  farm-house  in  a  deadening,  a 
loud  voice  cried  :  » 

"  Strangers,  wait  a  minnit  till  I  ketch  my  ole  mule,  or  he  '11  foller  you  uns 
clean  down  to  Boyd's,  I  reckon." 

The  owner  of  the  voice,  carrying  a  log  on  his  shoulder,  came  up  through  the 
fields  as  he  said  this,  and,  throwing  down  his  burden,  secured  the  restive  mule, 
who  was  looking  over  the  low  fence ;  after  which  he  turned  to  each  one  of  the 
party,  and  asked : 

"  What  mout  be  your  name  ?" 

Having  satisfied  his  curiosity  thus,  he  gave  us  good  evening  civilly  enough, 
and  struggled  with  his  log  again. 

Farther  on  a  young  farmer  crossing  the  creek  came  to  us  as  we  inquired  the 
distance,  and,  before  giving  us  the  desired  information,  said,  "What  mout  be 
your  names  ?"  "  Whar  are  ye  from  ?"  After  which  he  added  carelessly,  "  Mile 
'n  half;  good  evenin'." 


Mount  Pisgah,  Western  North  Carolina.      [Page  487.] 

Troops  of  children  played  about  the  doors  of  all  the  cabins  along  these  roads. 
Families  of  ten  and  twelve  are  by  no  means  uncommon.  Girls  and  boys  work 
afield  with  their  parents  in  the  summer,  and  pass  the  winter  with  but  limited 
chances  for  culture. 

Passing  around  the  base  of  "Jonathan's  Creek  Bald,"  we  came  into  a  more 
open  and  fertile  country,  where  the  farm-houses  were  neatly  built  and  painted, 
and  the  wheat-fields  were  wide  and  well  stocked.  The  creeks  were  numerous, 
and  everywhere  bordered  by  fascinating  foliage ;  at  each  turn  in  the  road  there 
was  a  picture ;  one  was  constantly  reminded  of  the  rich  views  in  the  Loire 
country  in  France,  or  of  the  fat  fields  of  Alsatia. 

On  the  plain  of  Waynesville,  2,756  feet  above  the  level  of  tide-water,  and  in 
the  shadow  of  the  great  Balsam  range,  stands  Waynesville  town.  The  approaches 
to  it  are  lovely,  but  the  view  from  the  town  itself  is  lovelier  still.  On  all  sides 
rise  the  mountains ;  the  village  nestles  between  the  forks  of  the  Pigeon  river, 
nowhere  more  beautiful  than  within  a  few  miles  of  this  nook. 


THE     BALSAM      PEAKS THE      BALD      MOUNTAINS. 


487 


To  the  westward  lie  the  Balsam  peaks,  seven  of  which,  Amos  Plott's,  the 
"  Great  Divide,"  Brother  Plott,  Rocky  Face,  Rockstand  Knob,  and  the  two 
Junaleskas,  tower  more  than  6,000  feet  high.  They  are  clad,  upon  their 
summits,  in  the  sombre  garb  of  the  balsam,  the  sad  and  haughty  monarch  of 
the  heights,  whose  odorous  boughs  brush  against  the  clouds,  and  whose  deep 
thickets,  into  which  the  sun  himself  can  hardly  penetrate,  afford  a  refuge  for 
the  wolf  and  the  bear.  The  balsam  is  emphatically  an  aristocratic  tree ;  it  is 
never  found  in  the  humble  valleys,  and  rarely  lower  than  an  elevation  of  4,000 
feet;  it  consorts  with  the  proud  rhododendron,  whose  scarlet  bloom  was  the 
object  of  the  Indian's  most  passionate  adoration,  and  its  grand  stem  springs 
from  among  the  decaying  and  moss-grown  rocks. 

On  these  Balsams,  as  on  the  great  Black  mountains,  the  moss  offers  an  elastic 
carpet  sometimes  a  foot  thick,  and  is  tough  and  hard  as  the  hides  of  the  bears 
who  delight  to  disport  upon  it.  Here  and  there  on  the  sides  of  the  Plott  peaks 
there  is  a  long  furrow  which  marks  the  path  cut  by  some  adventurous  woodsman. 
The  peaks  are  not  romantically  named ;  the  unimaginative  early  settlers  called 
them  after  the  men  who  owned  or  lived  near  them ; 
and  many  of  the  most  imposing  heights  are  still  nameless. 

The  Bald  mountains,; — so  called  because  their  summits 
are  destitute  of  forest,  and  because  the  sun  makes  the 
rocks  on  their  tops  glisten  like  a  bald  man's  shining 
poll, — are  numerous  in  the  vicinity  of  Waynesville. 
North  and  north-east  of  the  town  lie  the  "Crab  Tree" 
and  "Sandy  Mush"  Balds,  and  beyond  them  in  the 
same  direction  rises  "Bear  Wallow"  mountain.  On  the 
south  and  south-east  are  "  Mount  Pisgah,"  the  "  High 
Tower,"  and  Cold  mountain,  which  rises  6,063  feet  out 
of  the  "Big  Pigeon"  valley;  and  away  to  the  south  and 
south-east  stretches  the  chain  of  the  "Richland  Balsam." 

The  dry  and  pure  air  of  Waynesville  gives  new  value 
to  life ;  the  healthy  man  feels  a  strange  glow  and  inspira- 
tion while  in  the  shadow  of  these  giant  peaks.  The  town 
is  composed  of  one  long  street  of  wooden  houses,  wan- 
dering from  mountain  base  to  mountain  base.  It  has  a 
trio  of  country  stores ;  a  cozy  and  delightful  little  hotel, 
nestling  under  the  shade  of  a  huge  tree ;  an  old  wooden 
church  perched  on  a  hill,  with  a  cemetery  filled  with 
ancient  tombs,  where  the  early  settlers  lie  at  rest,  and 
an  academy. 

There  is  no  whir  of  wheels.  The  only  manufacturing 
establishments  are  flour- mills  located  on  the  various 
creeks  and  rivers,  or  a  stray  saw- mill ;  while  here  and  there  a  wealthy  land 
owner  is  building  an  elegant  home  with  all  the  modern  improvements.  By 
nine  o'clock  at  night  there  is  hardly  a  light  in  the  village ;  a  few  belated 
horsemen  steal  noiselessly  through   the   street,   or  the  faint  tinkle   of  a   banjo 


The  Carpenter— A  Study  from 
Waynesville  Life. 


488 


NOTES      FROM      WAYNESVILLE. 


and  the  patter  of  a  negro's  feet  testify  to  an  innocent  merry-making.  The 
Court- House  of  Haywood  county,  and  the  Jail,  both  modest  two-story  brick 
structures,  are  the  public  buildings,  the  Jail  having  only  now  and  then  an 
inmate,  for  the  county  is  as  orderly  as  a  community  of  Quakers.  The  Mar- 
shal, as  in  most  of  these  small  Western  North  Carolina  towns,  is  the  power  which 
maintains  and  enforces  the  law.  No  liquor  is  sold  within  a  mile  of  the  town's 
boundary;  some  lonely  and  disreputable  shanty,  with  the  words  "BAR-ROOM" 
inscribed  upon  it,  on  a  clearing  along  the  highway,  being  the  only  resort  for  those 
who  drink  "spirits."  The  sheriff,  the  local  clergyman,  the  county  surveyor,  and 
the  village  doctor,  ride  about  the  country  on  their  nags,  gossiping  and  dreamily 
enjoying  the  glorious  air ;  nowhere  is  there  bustle  or  noise  of  trade.  The  county 
court's  session  is  the  event  of  the  year ;  the  mail,  brought  forty-five  miles  over 
the  mountain  roads  from  the  nearest  railroad,  is  light,  and  the  stage-coaches 
bring  few  passengers  from  the  outer  world. 

But  what  a  perfect  summer  retreat ;  what  chances  for  complete  rest ;  what 
grandeur  of  mountains ;  what  quiet  rippling  of  gentle  rivers ;  what  noble 
sunsets;  what  wealth  of  color  and  dreaminess  of  twilight;  what  breezy  morn- 


Vievv  on  Pigeon  River,  near  Waynesville. 

ings,  when  the  mists  fly  away  from  the  deep  ravines  in  the  mountain  chains,  and 
shadow  and  sun  play  hide  and  seek  on  the  dense  masses  of  the  Balsam  tops ! 

The  great  counties  of  Haywood,  Jackson,  Macon,  Cherokee,  Buncombe, 
Henderson,  Madison  and  Yancey,  contain  the  principal  portion  of  the  mountain 
scenery  of  western  North  Carolina.  The  mighty  transverse  chains  of  the  Nan- 
tahela,  Cowee,  Balsam  and  Black  mountains,  run  across  these  counties  from  the 
Smoky  range  to  the  Blue  Ridge,  and  the  traveler  wandering  from  county  seat  to 
county  seat  must  constantly  climb  lofty  heights,  pass  through  rugged  gaps,  and 
descend  into  deep  valleys. 

Western  North  Carolina  is  not  only  exceedingly  fertile,  but  abounds  in  the 
richer  minerals,  and  needs  but  the  magic  wand  of  the  capitalist  waved  over  it  to 
become  one  of  the  richest  sections  of  this  Union.  Occupying  one-third  of  the 
entire  area  of  the  State,  and  possessing  more  than  a  quarter  of  a  million  of 
inhabitants,  its  present  prospects  are  by  no  means  disagreeable;  but  its  prom- 
inent citizens,  of  all  walks  in  life,  are  anxious  for  immigration  and  development 
of  the  rich  stores  of  gold,  iron,  copper,  mica,  and  other  minerals  now  buried  in 
the  hills. 


AGRICULTURE     AND     GRAZING.  IN     THE     MOUNTAINS.  489 

Let  no  one  fancy  that  this  mountain  region  is  undesirable  as  an  agricultural 
country;  there  are  few  richer,  or  better  adapted  to  European  immigration.  The 
staple  productions  of  Haywood  county  are  corn,  wheat,  rye,  oats  and  hay ;  all 
vegetables  grow  abundantly,  and  the  whole  county  is  admirably  fitted  for 
grazing.  The  level  bottom-lands  on  Pigeon  river  and  its  numerous  tributaries 
are  under  fine  cultivation ;  the  uplands  and  the  slopes  produce  rich  wheat ;  the 
ash,  the  sugar  maple,  the  hickory,  and  the  oak,  are  abundant ;  and  white  pine  is 
rafted  down  the  Pigeon  river  in  large  quantities  yearly. 

But  the  exceptional  fertility  of  most  of  the  ranges  throughout  all  the  counties 
mentioned  is  the  great  pride  of  the  section.  The  sides  and  tops  of  the  mount- 
ains are,  in  many  cases,  covered  with  a  thick,  vegetable  mould,*  in  which  grow 
flourishing  trees  and  rank  grasses.  Five  thousand  feet  above  the  sea-level  one 
finds  grasses  and  weeds  that  remind  him  of  the  lower  region  swamps.  Cattle 
are  kept  in  excellent  condition  all  winter  on  the  "  evergreen  "  growing  along  the 
sides  of  the  higher  chains.  Winter  and  summer,  before  the  ravages  of  the  war 
thinned  out  their  stocks,  the  farmers  kept  hundreds  of  cattle  on  the  mountains, 
feeding  entirely  on  the  grasses.  In  the  spring  the  herds  instinctively  seek  the 
young  grasses  springing  up  on  the  slopes,  but  with  the  coming  of  winter  they 
return  to  the  tops  to  find  the  evergreen.  The  balsam-tree  can  easily  be  ban- 
ished, for,  after  being  felled  for  a  few  months,  it  will  burn  easily,  and  in  its  stead 
will  spring  up  thick  coats  of  evergreen.  On  some  of  the  mountain  farms  corn 
yields  one  hundred  bushels  to  the  acre,  and  wheat,  oats,  rye  and  barley,  flourish 
proportionately.  In  the  "  deadenings,"  where  the  large  timber  has  been  girdled 
and  left  to  die,  and  the  undergrowth  has  been  carefully  cleared,  timothy  and 
orchard  grass  will  grow  as  high  as  wheat. 

The  native  grape,  too,  flourishes  on  all  the  hill-sides,  within  certain  thermal 
lines  established  by  observation  of  the  elder  mountaineers ;  and  varieties  of 
grapes  can  be  selected,  and  so  planted  as  to  ripen  at  different  periods  of  the 
autumn.  The  negro  population  is  not  numerous  in  Western  North  Carolina. 
Wherever  the  black  man  is  found,  however,  he  is  industrious,  faithful,  and  usually 
quite  prosperous.  In  some  of  the  small  tows,  as  at  Waynesville,  we  found  a 
gentleman's  valet  of  other  days  officiating  as  village  tailor,  barber,  errand  boy, 
coachman  and  "  factotum." 

*  Testimony  of  Professor  Richard  Owen,  of  the  Indiana  State  University. 


LVI. 


THE 


SUGAR      FORK        AND     DRY     FALLS — -WHITESIDE      MOUNTAIN. 


IT  is  sometimes  said  that  Western  North  Carolina  is  shaped    like "  a  bow,  of 
which  the  Blue  Ridge  would  form  the  arc,  and  the  Smoky  mountains  the 
string.     Within  this  semicircle  our  little  party,  now  and  then  increased  by  the 

advent  of  citizens  of  the 
various  counties,  who  came 
to  journey  with  us  from 
point  to  point,  traveled 
about  600  miles  on  horse- 
back, now  sleeping  at  night 
in  the  lowly  cabins,  and 
sharing  the  rough  fare  of 
the  mountaineers,  now 
entering  the  towns  and 
finding  the  mansions  of  the 
wealthier  classes  freely 
opened  to  us.  Up  at 
dawn,  and  away  over  hill 
and  dale ;  now  clambering 
miles  among  the  forests  to 
look  at  some  new  mine ; 
now  spurring  our  horses  to 
reach  shelter  long  after 
night  had  shrouded  the 
roadways,  we  met  with  un- 
varying  courtesy  and 
unbounded  welcome. 

As  a  rule,  the  younger 
men  with  whom  we  talked 
were  hopeful,  very  much 
in  earnest,  generally  free 
from  the  mountain  rustic 
dialect ;  took  in  one  or  two 
newspapers,  and  were  in- 
terested in  the  outer  world 
and  general  legislation;  but 
their  fathers,  the  farmers  of  the  "befo'  the  waw"  epoch,  were  discouraged  and 
somewhat  discontented  at  the  new  order  of  things ;   looked  upon  mineral  hunters 


The  Dry  Fall  of  the  Sugar  Fork,  Blue  Ridge,  North  Carolina.     [Page  497.] 


MINERALS     IN     WESTERN      NORTH     CAROLINA.  49I 

and  railroad  route  surveyors  with  coldness  or  contempt;  and  were  wont  to 
complain  of  their  own  lot  and  of  all  the  results  of  the  war.  The  young  and 
prominent  men  in  most  of  the  counties  were  good  companions  and  enthusiastic 
friends ;   they  had  none  of  the  artificial  manners  of  the  town,  none  of  its  guile. 

Wherever  we  went  we  found  the  "rock-hunters"  had  been  ahead  of  us,  and  a 
halt  by  the  wayside  at  noon  would  generally  bring  to  us  some  denizen  of  the 
neighborhood,  who  would  say,  "Good  mornin',  gentlemen.  After  rocks?" — 
and  would  then  produce  from  his  pockets  some  specimens  which  he  was  "  mighty 
certain  he  did  n't  know  the  name  of."  Many  a  farmer  had  caught  the  then 
prevalent  mica  fever,  and  some  had  really  found  deposits  of  the  valuable  mineral 
which  were  worth  thousands  of  dollars. 

There  is  little  danger  of  overestimating  the  mineral  wealth  of  this  mount- 
ain country ;  it  is  really  very  great.  There  are  stores  of  gold,  silver,  iron,  copper, 
zinc,  corundum,  coal,  alum,  copperas,  barytes,  and  marl,  which  seem  limitless. 
There  are  fine  marble  and  limestone  quarries  whose  value  was  unsuspected  until 
the  railroad  pioneer  disclosed  it.  The  limestone  belt  of  Cherokee  county,  a  wild 
and  romantic  region  still  largely  inhabited  by  Cherokee  Indians,  contains  stores 
of  marble,  iron  and  gold ;  Jackson  county  possesses  a  vast  copper  belt ;  and  the 
iron-beds  of  the  Yellow  mountains  are  attracting  much  notice.  The  two  most 
remarkable  gold  regions  are  in  Cherokee  and  Jackson  counties. 

The  Valley  river  sands  have  been  made,  in  former  times,  to  yield  handsomely, 
and  now  and  then  good  washings  have  been  found  along  its  tributaries.  The 
gold  is  found  in  veins  and  superficial  deposits  in  the  same  body  of  slates  which 
carries  limestone  and  iron.  Before  the  war  liberal  arrangements  had  been  made 
for  mining  in  Cherokee,  but  since  the  struggle  the  works  remain  incomplete.  It 
is  supposed  that  the  gold  belt  continues  south-westward  across  the  country,  as 
other  mines  are  found  in  the  edge  of  Georgia. 

The  gold  of  Jackson  county  is  obtained  from  washings  along  the  southern 
slopes  of  the  Blue  Ridge,  near  the  mountains  known  as  "  Hogback"  and  "  Chim- 
ney Top ;"  and  Georgetown  creek,  one  of  the  head  streams  of  the  Toxaway, 
yielded  several  hundred  thousand  dollars  a  few  years  ago.  In  this  wild  country, 
where  the  passes  of  the  Blue  Ridge  rise  precipitously  800  and  1,000  feet,  there 
lie  great  stores  of  gold. 

Overman,  the  metallurgist,  unhesitatingly  declares  that  he  believes  a  second 
California  is  hidden  in  these  rocky  walls.  The  monarch  mountain  "Whiteside" 
is  said  to  be  rich  in  gold. 

It  is  possible  that  the  iron  ore  of  these  mountains  will  not  be  speedily 
developed,  as  capital  is  now  so  powerfully  attracted  to  Missouri,  and  other  States, 
where  remarkable  deposits  exist ;  but  there  is  no  denying  the  richness  of  Chero- 
kee, Mitchell,  Buncombe,  Haywood,  Jackson,  and  Macon  counties  in  that  mineral. 
In  Cherokee  the  hematite  ores  outcrop  in  immense  quantities  along  the  Hiawas- 
see  and  Valley  rivers,  and,  when  wrought  in  the  commonest  county  bloomeries, 
have  yielded  an  astonishing  per  cent.  Rivers  flow  directly  through  the  iron 
regions  in  this  section,  furnishing  every  needed  facility  for  transportation ;  and 
limestone  and  forest  fuel  abound.     Magnetic  ores  are  found  in  Madison,  Hay- 


492 


FROM      WAYNESVILLE     TO     WHITESIDE. 


wood  and  Macon  counties ;  and  there  are  large  outcroppings  of  hematite  in 
Buncombe. 

Our  expedition  grew  rapidly  after  we  left  Waynesville,  and  our  group  of 
horsemen,  followed  by  "the  baggage  train,"  toiling  along  the  mountain  roads, 
caused  a  genuine  excitement  at  the  farms  by  the  way.  One  of  our  most  memor- 
able trips  was  that  from  Waynesville  to  Whiteside  and  the  return. 

Upon  the  beautiful  country  through  which  we  were  now  wandering  the 
Indian  lavished  that  wealth  of  affection  which  he  always  feels  for  nature,  but 
never  for  man.  He  gave  to  the  hills  and  streams  the  soft  poetic  names  of  his 
expansive  language — names  which  the  white  man  has  in  many  cases  cast  away, 
substituting  the  barbarous  commonplaces  of  the  rude  days  of  early  settlement. 

The  Cherokee  names  of  Cowee  and  Cullowhee,  of  Watauga,  of  Tuckaseege, 
and  Nantahela,  have  been  retained ;  and  some  of  the  elder  settlers  still  pronounce 
them  with  the  charming  Indian    accent  and  inflection.     The  Cowee  mountain 


View  near  Webster,  North  Carolina. 

range  runs  between  Jackson  and  Macon  counties,  and  the  valley  of  Tuckaseege, 
walled  in  four  crooked,  immense  stretches,  includes  all  of  Jackson  county  which 
lies  north  of  the  Blue  Ridge. 

The  river  itself,  one  of  the  most  picturesque  in  the  South,  "heads"  in  the 
Blue  Ridge,  and  swelling  into  volume  from  a  hundred  springs  of  coldest,  purest, 
most  transparent  water,  which  send  little  torrents  down  all  the  deep  ravines,  it 
goes  foaming  and  dashing  over  myriads  of  rocks,  sometimes  leaping  from  dizzy 
heights  into  narrow  canons,  until  it  comes  to,  and  is  lost  in,  the  Tennessee. 
Where  the  Tuckaseege  forces  its  way  through  the  Cullowhee  mountains  there  is 
a  stupendous  cataract. 

The  little  inn  at  Webster,  the  seat  of  justice  of  Jackson  county,  was  none  too 
large  to  accommodate  our  merry  cavalcade.  We  came  to  it  through  the  Balsam 
mountains  from  Waynesville,  along  a  pretty  road  bordered  with  farms  and  giant 
mulberry-trees.      In  the  valleys  we  saw  the  laurel  and  the  dwarf  rosebay,  the 


WEBSTER THE      COWEE      RANGE FRANKLIN.  493 

passion  flower  and  the  Turk's-cap  lily,  and  on  the  mountain  sides  the  poplar  or 
tulip-tree,  the  hickory,  ash,  black  and  white  walnut,  the  holly,  the  chincapin,  the 
alder,  and  the  chestnut,  each  in  profusion. 

Webster  is  a  little  street  of  wooden  houses,  which  seem  mutely  protesting 
against  being  pushed  off  into  a  ravine.  For  miles  around  the  country  is  grand 
and  imposing.  A  short  time  before  our  arrival  the  residents  of  the  county  had 
been  edified  by  the  execution  of  the  only  highwayman  who  has  appeared  in 
Western  North  Carolina  for  many  years.  The  hanging  occurred  in  front  of  the 
jail  in  the  village  street,  and  thousands  flocked  to  see  it  from  all  the  section 
round  about. 

Sunset  came  with  a  great  seal  of  glory.  Before  the  dawn  we  were  once  more 
in  the  saddle,  en  route  for  the  Cowee  range.  Just  below  Webster  we  crossed  the 
Tuckaseege  river  at  a  point  where  once  there  was  a  famous  Indian  battle,  and 
wound  up  the  zigzag  paths  to  the  very  top  of  Cowee,  now  and  then  getting  a 
glimpse  of  the  noble  Balsam  left  behind.  Now  we  could  look  up  at  one  of  the 
"old  balds,"  as  the  bare  peaks'  tops  are  called.  (The  Indian  thought  the  bare 
spots  were  where  the  feet  of  the  Evil  One  had  pressed  as  he  strode  from 
mountain  to  mountain.)  Now  we  stopped  under  a  sycamore,  while  a  barefooted 
girl  brought  a  pitcher  of  buttermilk  from  the  neighboring  house  ;  now  a  group  of 
negro  children,  seeing  a  band  of  eight  horsemen  approaching,  made  all  speed  for 
the  house,  evidently  thinking  us  Ku-Klux  or  "Red  Strings"  resuscitated;  and 
now  a  smart  shower  would  beat  about  our  heads,  and  die  away  in  tearful  whis- 
perings among  the  broad  leaves.  The  mile-stones  by  the  roadside  were  notched 
to  indicate  the  distance ;  and  from  hour  to  hour,  in  the  mountain  passes,  stops 
were  made  to  whoop  up  the  laggards. 

In  the  rich  coves  in  Jackson  county  the  black  mould  is  more  than  two  feet  in 
depth,  and  the  most  precipitous  mountain  sides  are  grazing  pastures,  from  which 
thousands  of  fat  cattle  are  annually  driven  down  to  the  seaboard  markets.  In  the 
ranges,  too,  where  the  winter  grass  grows  luxuriantly  from  November  until  May, 
great  numbers  of  horses  and  mules  are  raised.  Fruit  grows  with  Eden-like  lux- 
uriance ;  the  apple  is  superb,  and  on  the  thermal  belt  in  all  this  section  the  fruit 
crop  never  fails. 

Near  Franklin,  close  to  the  site  of  an  old  Indian  fortification,  we  crossed  the 
"Little  Tennessee,"  a  stately  river,  along  whose  banks  are  noble  quarries  of 
marble,  never  yet  worked.  The  chief  town  of  Macon  county  was  fair  to  look 
upon,  seated  amidst  well- cultivated  fields,  and  in  the  immediate  vicinity  of  a 
grand  grazing  country ;  but  we  pushed  on  into  the  mountains  once  more,  anxious 
to  pass  the  Blue  Ridge  and  climb  the  ribs  of  "Whiteside."  Three  hundred 
thousand  acres  still  remain  unimproved  in  Macon,  and  at  least  one-third  of  these 
are  rich  in  minerals. 

We  were  now  approaching  the  extreme  western  border  of  the  State.  A  little 
beyond  lay  Cherokee  and  Clay  counties,  a  territory  taken  from  the  Indians  by 
treaty  no  later  than  1835-36.  They  lie  in  the  valley  of  the  Hiawassee,  which 
is  famous  as  the  place  where  the  first  successful  treaty  was  made.  We  pushed  on 
until  dark,  and  our  little  party  was  dispersed  at  the  various  farm-houses  on  the 

.32 


494  THE   SUGARTOWN   FORK   OF   THE   TENNESSEE. 

road,  with  instructions  to  gallop  up  and  meet  in  the  morning  before  reaching  the 
foot  of  the  Blue  Ridge. 

The  stream  along  whose  banks  we  were  now  ascending  the  mountain  is  known 
as  the  "  Sugartown  "  or  "  Sugar  Fork  "  of  the  Tennessee  river,  and  comes  foam- 
ing down  the  wild  slopes  of  the  Blue  Ridge  through  some  of  the  most  romantic 
scenery  in  America.  Beautiful  as  the  Rhone  in  the  Alps,  majestic  in  its 
tremendous  waterfalls,  and  the  wild  grandeur  of  the  passes  through  which  it 
flows,  it  is  strange  that  few  travelers  from  other  States  have  ever  penetrated 
to  its  upper  waters. 

It  was  not  without  difficulty  that  our  party  reassembled  the  next  morning. 
The  Colonel  and  the  sprightly  Jonas  came  galloping  from  a  town  ten  miles  away, 
where  they  had  been  compelled  to  remain  overnight,  and  the  others  came 
straggling  to  the  rendezvous.  The  village  physician  from  Webster,  who  knew 
every  foot  of  the  way  for  forty  miles  around,  the  cheery  landlord  from  Waynes- 
ville,  and  the  writer  climbed  the  steep  hill-side  slowly  under  a  broiling  sun;  the 
artist,  hungry  for  sketches,  browsed  lightly  on  the  delicate  vistas  afforded  by 
every  turn  in  the  road ;  and  the  Judge,  who  had  enlisted  in  our  service  that 
genial  and  venerable  mountaineer,  Silas  McDowell,  was  actively  hunting  for  the 
obscure  pathway  leading  to  the  lower  falls ;  while  the  colored  servant  guided  an 
overloaded  buggy  along  the  rocky  road. 

As  we  reached  the  crest  of  the  hill  a  sound  like  the  sweep  of  the  wind 
through  the  forest  in  autumn,  or  the  distant  echo  of  the  rush  of  a  railway  train, 
drifted  to  our  ears.  Now  it  was  swept  away,  now  came  back  again  powerfully. 
It  Avas  the  voice  of  the  fall  in  the  canon  below,  and  old  Mr.  McDowell,  reining 
in  his  horse  and  placing  his  hand  to  his  ear,  listened  intently  a  minute,  then 
announced  that  the  pathway  to  the  falls  was  not  far,  between  Lamb  and  Skittles 
mountains,  from  that  spot.  So  we  began  to  search  for  it,  some  one  meantime 
volunteering  the  information  that  the  ravines  abounded  with  rattlesnakes,  and 
that  one  must  tread  carefully. 

"What  do  you  think  of  that?"  said  one,  turning  to  the  gray-haired  guide. 
"  Had  we  better  go  down  this  way  ?" 

"  Sir,"  said  he,  fiercely,  "  I  have  a  contempt  for  snakes,  sir.  I  kick  them  out 
of  my  way,  sir.      I  kill  them  before  they  have  a  chance  to  bite  me,  sir." 

Cold  comfort,  but  no  alternative;  and,  Indian-file,  we  moved  toward  the 
descent.  After  a  walk  of  200  yards  through  a  pleasant  grass-grown  space,  we 
came  to  the  hill's  abrupt  sides,  broken  by  ledges  and  clothed  with  tangled  vines 
and  underbrush.  A  slight  and  scarcely  perceptible  trail  led  along  the  dizzy 
height,  but  was  now  and  then  lost  entirely  as  one  came  to  a  rock,  over  which  he 
was  compelled  to  crawl  and  drop  cautiously  into  black-looking  caves  and  dens, 
out  of  which  the  only  sortie  was  another  still  more  difficult  scramble. 

Bears  are  often  seen  in  these  mountains  now-a-days,  and  "  hard  times  "  will 
bring  them  into  the  vicinity  of  the  farmers'  cabins.  The  bear  of  this  region 
is  black,  grows  somewhat  larger  than  in  the  swamps  of  the  eastern  part  of  the 
State,  and  has  a  glossy  fur-like  coat  of  hair.  One  sometimes  comes  upon  the 
wallows  in  the  moss  where  Bruin  has  been  taking  his  siesta. 


GETTING  DOWN   TO  THE   FALL. 


495 


Half-way  down  the  mountain  we  could  hear  the  roar  of  the  fall,  and  some- 
times, through  an  opening  in  the  trees,  catch  a  glimpse  of  the  white  foam  as  it 
poured  over  the  rocks.  Guided  by  the  Judge's  cheery  halloo,  and  the  occa- 
sional crack  of  a  revolver,  we  reached  the  valley,  swinging  down  by  branches 
of  trees,  and  tearing  our  hands  against  the  rough  rocks.  The  Colonel  suddenly 
disappeared. 

Many  a  halloo  failed  to  bring  him,  and  I  waded  through  the  cold  pool  at  the 
foot  of  a  great  ledge,    staggered   out  of  the   knee- deep,   chilly  water  on  to   a 


Lower  Sugar  Fork  lall,  Blue  Ridge,  North  Carolina. 

shelving  platform,  clambered  over  a  half- rotten  tree- trunk,  and  reached  a  pin- 
nacle midstream,  from  whose  jagged  summit  I  could  see  the  top  of  the  falls  and 
the  twin  pine-trees  leaning  over  the  huge  chasm  as  if  it  awed  at  the  spectacle. 
Around  this  pinnacle  ran  a  whirlpool,  which  made  a  fierce  eddy  at  the  very  base 
of  the  projection  on  which  I  stood.  Forcing  myself  up  among  the  extending 
boughs  of  another  pine-tree,  with  my  boots  in  one  hand  and  my  staff  in  my 


49^  THE  WATERFALL   IN   THE   CANON. 

mouth,  I  was  just  reaching  the  top  when  a  limb  gave  way,  and  I  slid  rapidly 
down  twenty  feet  directly  toward  the  pool.  A  desperate  wrench  at  a  knot  on 
the  tree  stopped  me,  however,  and  I  finally  reached  my  perch  in  safety. 

To  the  right  was  a  ledge,  a  hundred  feet  high,  down  which  trailed  moss  and 
vines,  and  along  which  grew  tiny  white  blossoms  in  dense  masses.  Far  below 
this  ledge  on  a  rock,  which  he  had  reached  by  a  dexterous  drop,  sat  the  artist, 
sketching.  In  the  distance  was  Jonas,  clambering  on  all  fours  up  a  wet  stone 
directly  under  the  shadow  of  the  fall,  and  now  and  then  turning  to  whoop  at  the 
others.  No  Judge,  no  Colonel  visible !  but  now  and  then  a  faint  halloo  showed 
them  still  struggling  in  the  glens. 

A  gap  in  the  mountains,  high  up,  was  pierced  by  a  rapidly  flowing  stream, 
which  boiled  into  'whitest  foam  as  it  sprang  down  the  sides  of  a  great  rock 
from  a  shelf  jutting  out  of  the  mass.  At  the  right  grew  tall  trees  and  infinite 
small  foliage,  clothing  the  walls,  which  descended  hundreds  of  feet,  with  living 
green,  and  with  blue,  white,  and  red  blossoms  ;  on  the  left  the  ledge  ran  up  into 
a  peak  in  front,  then  receded  toward  the  crest  of  the  hill  which  we  had  left. 
Eighty  or  ninety  feet  below  the  shelf  from  which  the  foam  leaped  it  met  some 
obstacle,  and,  springing  to  the  right  in  blinding  clouds  of  spray,  which  at  times 
filled  the  canon  for  some  distance,  it  formed  a  second  fall  extending  thirty  feet 
down  to  the  lower  channel. 

On  the  left,  across  the  face  of  the  lower  part  of  the  cliff,  ran  minor  torrents, 
bubbling  and  seething,  and  everywhere  the  current  was  swift,  strong,  and 
musical.  Landing  as  I  did  midstream,  and  facing  the  fall,  there  seemed  no 
exit  from  the  valley  save  by  balloon.  On  every  side  the  walls  appeared  to 
rise  perpendicularly,  and,  indeed,  the  trail  was  found  only  after  vexatious 
scrambling  among  the  rocks.  When  I  reached  the  top,  the  others  had  departed, 
and  I  overtook  them  at  a  log-cabin,  where  they  had  halted  for  dinner.  The 
Colonel  smilingly  presented  himself. 

"I  got  a  fall  from  a  high  rock,"  said  he,  in  apology,  "and  lost  the  antidote 
for  rattlesnake  bites,  which  I  carried  for  you  others,  out  of  my  pocket.  It  took 
me  a  good  hour  to  find  it  again.      Besides,  I  have  seen  the  falls  once  before." 

The  cabin  where  we  rested  stood  on  a  very  steep  hill-side,  and  was  com- 
posed of  two  solidly-constructed  square  log  buildings,  connected  by  a  porch. 
The  furniture  was  of  the  simplest  character.  There  was  a  fire-place,  a  rough 
board-table,  with  benches  around  it,  a  spinning-wheel,  and  a  quilting-frame,  at 
which  three  tall  girls  were  busily  working.  The  rude  walls  and  the  plank  floor 
were  bare. 

In  the  other  room  stood  one  or  two  high  bedsteads,  of  simple  pattern  ;  a 
mirror,  a  few  inches  square,  hung  near  them ;  a  little  stand  with  a  Bible  on  it, 
and  a  rustic  bureau  pushed  against  the  wall.  The  venerable  matron  of  the  house- 
hold, with  her  gray  hair  combed  smoothly  back  under  her  sun-bonnet,  which  she 
kept  on,  stood  guard  over  the  table  with  a  fly-brush,  and  while  she  gossiped  with 
the  Doctor,  served  buttermilk  from  an  earthen  jar. 

"  Jeems — Jeems  is  my  youngest  son's  name,  Doctor.  He  '11  be  eighteen 
this  year;   'n  he's  a  right  smart  boy." 


MOUNTAIN      FOLK  —  THE      "DRY      FALL."  497 

Although  sixty,  at  least,  the  matron  was  strong  and  hearty ;  had  reared  a 
large  family,  and  never  felt  the  need  of  anything  more  than  she  possessed. 
"Reckoned  them  folks  that  was  huntin'  for  rocks  better  tend  to  ther-corn, 
she  did." 

A.  little  higher  up  the  mountain,  in  the  mica- lands,  our  artist  was  confronted 
by  the  belle  of  that  region.  She  was  pretty.  She  had  evidently  been  informed 
as  to  our  coming  by  the  cunning  mischief  of  the  urbane  Colonel,  and  approach- 
ing the  man  of  pencils  remarked,  with  a  delightful  bashfulness : 

"  I  want  you  to  take  my  picture." 

Imagine  him  trying  to  explain. 

"  Well,  they  said  anyway  that  you  'd  take  all  our  pictures,  'n  my  sister  's 
waitin'  up  t'  our  house's,  'n  law !  how  fur'd  you  uns  come  this  mornin'  ?  Jim 
Lawson  !  ef  you  don't  keep  thet  horse's  heels  away  from  me !"  to  a  North  Car- 
olina cavalier,  anxious  to  show  us  his  horsemanship  by  plunging  down  a  steep 
bank. 

Straightway  she  led  the  gentle  artist  captive, — the  pretty  mountain  girl  with 
her  hair  combed  smoothly  down  over  her  cheeks,  and  with  her  comely  form 
robed  in  green. 

By  and  by,  in  the  afternoon,  the  reunited  party,  as  it  crept  skyward,  plunged, 
Indian-file,  into  the  forest,  and  took  its  way  to  the  "  Dry  Falls."  A  silence,  not 
of  gloom  but  of  reverence,  seemed  to  fall  upon  all  as  we  entered  the  aisles  of  the 
grand  wood,  and  climbed  the  knolls  which  rose  like  whales'  backs  every  few 
hundred  yards.  We  were  already  well  upon  the  Blue  Ridge,  and  crossing 
toward  its  southern  side,  in  which  the  monarch  rocks  "Whiteside,"  "Black 
Rock,"  "  Stooly,"  and  "  Fodder  Stack,"  are  rooted.  Here  and  there  the  "  Sur- 
veyor," who  had  joined  us,  stopped  to  look  for  his  mark  on  a  tree,  and  his  sturdy 
little  horse  seemed  by  instinct  to  find  his  way  athwart  the  furze. 

After  two  miles  of  climbing,  sometimes  where  the  hills  were  so  steep  that  in 
descending  a  misstep  of  the  horse  would  have  cost  one  a  broken  limb,  we  came  to 
a  long  line  of  laurel  thicket.  Here,  taking  our  oil  capes,  we  scrambled  into  the 
bushes,  and,  stooping,  worked  our  way  to  a  cliff,  down  which  rugged  steps  were 
cut,  and  stood  where  we  could  overlook  the  canon  into  which  the  upper  fall  of 
the  Sugar  Fork  sent  its  leaping  water. 

The  Hibernianism  by  which  this  glorious  cascade  gets  its  designation  of  the 
"  Dry  Falls,"  was  suggested  by  the  possibility  of  passing  beneath  the  giant  shelf, 
over  which  it  pours,  without  severe  wetting,  although  the  spray  is  at  times  blind- 
ing. The  river,  coming  to  a  dizzy  height,  leaps  out  with  such  force,  that  the 
water  is  projected  far  from  the  rock,  and  the  beholder  seems  to  see  a  lace  veil,  at 
least  sixty  feet  long,  dependent  from  the  hoary  walls  of  the  canon.  Passing 
under  it,  along  the  slippery  rocks,  one  comes  out  upon  another  stone  under 
beetling  precipices,  from  which  little  streams  run  down,  and  around  which  the 
mist  and  spray  rise,  and  can  note  the  changing  gleams  of  the  sunshine  as  they 
play  on  the  immense  mass  of  foam  suspended  between  earth  and  sky. 

Below,  the  stream  passionately  clutches  at  the  rocks,  and  now  and  then 
throws  them  down  into  the  chasm;  there  are  hollows  in  the  stones,  which  have 


49^  APPROACHING     WHITESIDE. 

been  worn  to  a  considerable  depth  by  the  pattering  of  the  spray  upon  them  for 
hundreds  of  years.  Here  a  mass  of  wall  rises  dozens  of  feet  from  the  chaos  of 
rocks  which  is  huddled  at  the  fall's  bottom.  Many  of  the  rude  figures  seem  to 
have  human  resemblances,  and  one  might  imagine  them  giants  rising  from  the 
canon's  depths  to  tear  away  the  veil  which  has  been  drawn  across  the  entrance  to 
their  cavern. 

A  hundred  and  fifty  feet  below  the  summit  of  the  falls,  the  stream  runs  on 
in  whirlpools  and  eddies,  now  forming  into  inlets  in  which  reeds,  ferns  and 
blossoms  nourish,  and  now  making  a  deep,  steady  current,  cold  and  crystal  clear. 
The  pines  and  spruces  seventy  feet  high  seem  but  toys  by  the  sides  of  these 
immense  walls ;  the  light,  too,  in  the  gap  through  the  mountain,  is  strange  and 
fantastic,  and  seems  to  cast  a  glamour  over  every  minute  object.  Even  the 
pebbles,  and  the  ferns  and  tiny  grass-sprouts  in  the  soil  beneath  the  shelf  over 
which  the  fall  pours,  are  purple. 

Then  the  voice — the  voice  of  the  fall !  Heard  from  the  laurel  thicket,  it 
seems  to  come  from  the  very  ground  under  your  feet ;  heard  from  the  cavern 
into  which  you  pass,  it  is  sombre  and  complaining,  like  the  winter  wind  about 
the  house  chimneys ;  and  its  echoes  from  the  foot  of  the  rapids,  to  which  you 
may  descend  if  you  have  firm  nerves  and  a  quick  step,  are  like  those  from  some 
unseen  choir  in  a  cathedral  gallery, — some  chant  of  priests  at  High  Mass, 
monotonous,  grand,  inspiring;  "the  height,  the  glow,  the  gloom,  the  glory,"  all 
blended,  shock  and  awe  the  soul. 

Here  is  a  fall  upon  whose  virgin  rocks  no  quack  has  painted  his  shameless 
sign ;  whose  precipices  have  not  been  invaded  by  the  mob  of  the  grand  tour ; 
whose  solitary  magnificence  thrills  and  impresses  you  as  if  in  some  barren  land 
you  came  upon  the  dazzling  lustre  of  a  priceless  diamond.  But  to  this,  and  its 
brother  a  few  miles  below,  the  feet  of  thousands  of  the  curious  will  hereafter 
wander. 

The  shadows  were  creeping  over  the  mighty  hills  as  we  hastened  back  across 
the  wooded  slopes,  and  leaving  the  main  road  a  little  farther  on,  entered  a  narrow 
trail,  obstructed  by  swampy  holes  and  gnarled  tree-roots.  Three  miies  brought 
us  to  "Wright's" — the  little  farm-house  in  a  deadening  from  which  we  obtained 
a  view  of  "Short-Off," — and  the  forest  which  hid  the  approaches  to  "Whiteside." 
For  some  time  we  had  felt  the  exhilarating  effects  of  the  keen,  rarefied  air,  and 
had  noticed  the  exquisite  atmospheric  effects  peculiar  to  these  regions.  The 
figure  of  the  distant  mountain  stood  out  with  startling  clearness  against  the 
heavens ;  it  seemed  near  at  hand,  whereas  it  was  in  reality  miles  away.  The 
land  is  of  wonderful  fertility ;  even  the  imperfect  cultivation  which  it  has  received 
in  the  clearings  gives  surprising  results ;  and  the  timber  is  magnificent.  All  the 
land  is  suitable  for  small  grains  and  roots,  gives  fine  pasturage,  and  there  are 
numerous  quartz  veins  running  through  the  hills,  indicating  the  presence  of  gold 
in  large  quantities.  The  Indians  once  mined  successfully  for  silver  along  the 
slopes  of  the  Blue  Ridge,  near  "  Whiteside ;"  but,  although  they  left  the  region 
only  thirty  years  ago,  and  search  has  often  been  made  for  their  riches,  no  traces 
of  them  have  yet  been  found. 


THE      DEVIL    S      COURT-HOUSE. 


499 


The  Spaniards  once  prospected  for  minerals,  and  with  evident  success,  in  all 
these  regions ;  and  in  Cherokee  county  immense  excavations,  supposed  to  be  the 
work  of  De  Soto  and  his  army,  have  been  discovered.  Some  years  ago  copper 
crucibles,  with  traces  of  white  metal  still  remaining  in  them,  were  unearthed  at  a 
place  where  a  vein  of  lead,  silver  and  gold  may  be  noted. 

The  summit  of  Whiteside  is  perhaps  5,000  feet  high,  but  its  peculiar  location 
enables  one  to  gain  from  it  the  most  striking  prospect  in  North  Carolina.  It 
overlooks  a  country  of  peaks  and  projections,  of  frightful  precipices,  often  of 
naked  rock,  but  generally  fringed  with  delicate  foliage ;  a  country  dotted  with 
fertile  clearings  set  down  in  the  midst  of  forests ;  of  valleys  inaccessible  save  by 


The  Devil's  Court-House,  Whiteside  Mountain; 

narrow  passes  ;  of  curious  caves  and  tangled  trails  ;  of  buttes  and  knobs,  reached 
only  by  dangerous  passes,  where  one  finds  the  bluff's  base  thousands  of  feet 
down  in  some  nook,  and  as  he  looks  up  sees  the  wall  towering  far  above  him. 

At  dawn  of  next  day  we  plunged  into  the  woods  beyond  "Wright's,"  and 
wound  through  a  trail  whose  trace  we  of  the  cities  should  soon  have  lost,  but  in 
which  our  companions  of  the  neighborhood  easily  kept  until  we  reached  a  wooded 
hill-side,  whence  we  could  see  the  "Devil's  Court-House,"  and  catch  a  glimpse  of 
"  Whiteside's  "  top. 


gOO  THE      SUMMIT     OF      WHITESIDE. 

The  former  is  a  grand,  rocky  bluff,  with  its  foot  planted  among  the  thickets, 
and  its  brow  crowned  with  a  rugged  castle-like  formation.  The  ragged  sides  are 
here  and  there  stained  like  the  walls  of  an  old  building,  and  it  is  not  difficult  to 
imagine  that  one  is  beholding  the  ruined  walls  of  some  giant  castle.  The  "  Sur- 
veyor "  urged  us  forward,  and  our  stout  horses  soon  brought  us  to  the  clearing, 
where  we  were  compelled  to  leave  them,  and  climb  the  remaining  distance  on  foot. 

Here,  more  than  4,000  feet  above  the  ocean-level,  the  sun  beat  down  with 
extreme  fierceness,  and  was  reflected  back  from  the  hard  white  of  the  rocks  with 
painful  intensity.  The  horses  tethered,  the  Judge  sprang  up  the  narrow  pathway, 
and  regardless  of  rattlesnakes,  we  clambered  on  all  fours,  clinging  sometimes  to 
roots,  sometimes  to  frail  and  yielding  bunches  of  grass  and  ferns ;  now  trod 
breathlessly  a  path  in  the  black  dirt  on  the  edge  of  a  rock  sixty  feet  high ;  now 
hung,  poised  by  our  hands,  from  one  ledge  while  we  swung  to  another ;  and  now 
dug  out  footholds  in  the  stone  when  we  ascended  an  almost  perpendicular 
wall. 

Finally  we  came  to  a  plateau  covered  with  a  kind  of  gorse,  and  with  laurel 
bushes  scattered  here  and  there ;  pushing  through  this,  we  wound,  by  a  gradual 
ascent,  to  the  summit  of  Whiteside,  and  the  edge  of  the  precipice.  There  we 
were  face  to  face  with  the  demon  of  the  abyss. 

Let  me  tell  you  how  the  Surveyor  saw  him. 

"  One  day,"  said  the  Surveyor,  seating  himself  with  admirable  carelessness  on 
the  dreadful  slope  of  a  rock  overhanging  the  awful  depths,  "  I  was  taking  some 
levels  below,  and  at  last  thought  I  would  climb  Whiteside.  While  I  was  coming 
up  a  storm  passed  over  the  mountains,  and  when  I  reached  the  top  everything 
was  hidden  in  such  a  dense  mist,  fog,  or  cloud,  that  one  could  hardly  see  his 
hand  before  his  face.  I  strolled  on  until  I  reached  a  spot  which  I  thought  I 
recognized,  and  sat  down,  stretching  my  feet  carelessly. 

"  Luckily  enough,  I  did  n't  move ;  I  was  mighty  still,  for  I  was  tired,  and  the 
fog  was  solemn-like ;  but  pretty  soon  it  blew  away  right  smart,  and  dog  my  skin 
if  I  was  n't  perched  on  the  very  outer  edge  of  this  line  of  rock,  and  about  two 
inches  between  me  and  twelve  hundred  feet  of  sheer  fall. 

"  I  saw  the  trees  in  Casher's  valley,  and  the  clearings,  and  then  the  sky,  for  I 
did  n't  look  twice  at  the  fall  below  me;  but  I  flattened  myself  against  the  rock,  and 
turned  over;  and  I  never  want  to  come  up  here  in  a  fog  again." 

Imagine  a  waterfall  2,000  feet  high  suddenly  turned  to  stone,  and  you  have 
the  general  effect  of  the  Whiteside  precipice  as  seen  in  the  single,  terrified,  reluct- 
ant glance  which  you  give  from  the  top.  There  is  the  curve  and  the  grand, 
dizzy  bend  downward ;  were  it  not  for  occasional  clumps  of  foliage  down  the 
sides,  the  resemblance  would  be  absolute. 

The  mountain  itself  lies  rooted  in  the  western  slope  of  the  Blue  Ridge.  The 
veteran  McDowell  has  compared  it  to  the  carcass  of  some  great  monster,  upon 
whose  head  you  climb,  and  along  whose  mammoth  spine  you  wander,  giddy  with 
terror  each  time  you  gaze*over  the  skeleton  sides. 

The  main  rock  stands  on  a  hill  1,600  feet  high,  and  its  upper  crest  is  2,400 
feet  above  the  branch  of  the  Chattooga  river,  which  runs  near  the  hill's  base. 


THE      OUTLOOK      OVER      THE      MOUNTAINS. 


501 


From  top  to  tail  of  the  mammoth  skeleton  the  distance  is  800  feet.  Viewed  at  a 
proper  distance,  in  the  valley  below,  from  its  south-east  front,  it  is  one  of  the 
sublimest  natural  monuments  in  the  United  States.  The  sunshine  plays  upon 
walls  which  are  at  times  of  dazzling  whiteness,  and  the  sheer  fall  seems  to 
continue  to  the  very  level  of  the  valley,  although  it  is  here  and 
there  broken  by  landings. 

But  the  outlook!  It  was  the  culmination — the  finishing 
stroke  of  all  our  rich  and  varied  mountain  surprises !  When 
we  were  seated  on  the  white  crag,  over 
which  a  fresh  breeze  perpetually  blew, 
the  "wrinkled"  world  beneath  us  literally 
"crawled."  Everything  seemed  dwarfed 
and  insignificant  below.  Even  the 
brother  crags — to  the  south-west,  Fod- 
derstack  and  Black  Rock,  and  Stooly, 
to  the  north-west — although  in  reality 
rising  nearly  to  the  elevation  of  White- 
side, seemed  like  small  hills. 

To  the  north-east,  as  far  as  the 
eye  could  reach,  rose  a  multitude,  of 
sharply  denned  blue  and  purple  peaks, 
the  valleys  between  them,  vast  and 
filled  with  frightful  ravines,  seeming  the 
merest  gullies  on  the  earth's  surface. 
Farther  off  than  this  line  of  peaks 
rose  the  dim  outlines  of  the  Balsam 
and  Smoky  ranges.  In  the  distant  south- 
west, looking  across  into  Georgia,  we 
could  descry  "  Mount  Yonah,"  lonely  and  superb,  with  a  cloud- wreath  about 
his  brow;  sixty  miles  away,  in  South  Carolina,  a  flash  of  sunlight  revealed 
the  roofs  of  the  little  German  settlement  of  "Walhalla;"  and  on  the  south- 
east, beyond  the  precipices  and  ragged  projections,  towered  up  "  Chimney 
Top"  mountain,  while  the  "Hog  Back"  bent  its  ugly  form  against  the  sky, 
and  "  Cold "  mountain  rose  on  the  left.  Turning  to  the  north,  we  beheld 
"Yellow"  mountain,  with  its  square  sides,  and  "Short-Off."  Beyond  and 
beyond,  peaks  and  peaks,  and  ravines  and  ravines !  It  was  like  looking  down 
on  the  world  from  a  balloon. 

The  wealthy  citizens  of  South  Carolina  have  long  known  of  the  charms  of  this 
section,  and  many  of  them  annually  visit  it.  In  a  few  years  its  wildness  will  be 
tamed;  a  summer  hotel  will  doubtless  stand  on  the  site  of  "Wright's"  farm-house, 
and  the  lovely  forests  will  be  penetrated  by  carriage  roads  ;  steps  will  be  cut 
along  the  ribs  of  Whiteside ;  and  a  shelter  will  be  erected  on  the  very  summit. 
A  storm  on  the  vast  rock,  with  the  lightning  playing  hide  and  seek  in  the  crevi- 
ces of  the  precipice,  is  an  experience  which  gives  one  an  enlarged  idea  of  the 
powers  of  Heaven. 


Jonas  sees  the  Abyss. 


502  A  DANGEROUS  PASS — DOWN  THE  TUCKASEEGE. 

There  is  one  pass  on  Whiteside  which,  though  eminently  dangerous,  is  now 
and  then  essayed,  and  Jonas  and  one  of  the  woodmen  of  our  party  resolved 
to  try  it.  While  we  commoner  mortals  drank  in  the  wonderful  view,  and  hob- 
nobbed with  the  clouds,  these  adventurers  climbed  down  the  precipice's  sides, 
and  coming  to  a  point  not  far  from  the  Devil's  Court- House,  where  the  pass 
begins,  launched  themselves  boldly  forward.  To  gain  a  cave  which  is  supposed 
in  former  times  to  have  been  the  abode  of  an  Indian  sorcerer  or  medicine  man, 
they  were  compelled  to  step  out  upon  a  narrow  ledge  running  along  the  very  side 
of  the  cliff,  turning  a  corner  with  no  support  above  or  below.  The  ledge  or  path 
is,  at  its  beginning,  two  feet  wide,  and  as  it  nears  the  cavern,  not  more  than 
eighteen  inches  in  width.  A  single  misstep  or  a  failing  of  the  nerves  would 
have  precipitated  them  a  thousand  feet  into  the  valley,  and  above  them  the  com- 
fortless rock  rose  300  feet.  Hugging  the  wall,  and  fairly  flattening  themselves 
against  it,  they  calmly  went  forward  and  reached  the  cavern  in  safety.  Return- 
ing, with  their  eyes  blinded  by  the  shadows  of  the  rocky  crevice,  the,  demon  of 
the  abyss  seized  upon  Jonas,  and  prompted  him  to  look  down.  One  glance,  and 
the  awful  depths  seemed  to  claim  him.  He  shrank  toward  the  wall,  dug  his  finger- 
nails into  the  crevices,  uttered  a  faint  cry,  looked  up,  and  was  saved.  His  com- 
panion, following  imperturbably  behind,  did  not  trouble  himself  about  the  depths, 
and  striding  coolly  forward,  with  his  hand  filled  with  mineral  specimens,  came  out 
upon  the  plateau  unmoved,  while  Jonas  seemed  to  have  seen  spectres. 

From  time  to  time  "Indian  ladders,"  —  huge  trunks  of  trees  with  the 
boughs  so  chopped  off  as  to  form  steps, — have  been  found  on  Whiteside,  indi- 
cating that  the  savages  frequently  visited  the  mountain,  and  the  tradition  that  it 
was  the  scene  of  some  of  their  superstitious  rites  seems  well  authenticated.  Now- 
a-days  a  few  young  men  wander  about  its  hills  and  ravines,  inspecting  their 
bear-traps,  and  sometimes  are  fortunate  enough  to  encounter  a  shaggy  bruin, 
wallowing  in  moss  or  ensconced  near  a  tree. 

At  evening,  as  we  reposed  at  Wright's,  the  thunder  broke  along  the  sky,  and 
the  lightning  struck  among  the  rocks  on  the  adjacent  hills.  The  storm  was 
mighty  and  beautiful ;  a  strange,  rushing  wind  came  with  it,  bending  the  forest 
growths  like  willows,  and  then  the  clouds  covered  the  mountain  top,  and  a  fine 
mist  fell.  The  sky  was  luminous,  the  lightning  seeming  to  rend  it  in  twain,  and 
we  were  mute  and  frightened  before  the  terrific  grandeur  of  the  battling 
elements. 

"  Whiteside"  stands  near  the  extreme  south-eastern  border  of  Macon  county. 
We  descended  from  it  down  the  Tuckaseege  valley  into  Jackson.  Through  both 
these  counties  runs  an  extensive  copper  belt ;  the  ore  in  Jackson  county  being 
mainly  bisulphuret  or  green  carbonate  of  copper.  In  this  region  the  advan- 
tages for  the  location  of  grazing-farms  are  superb,  because  the  high  mountains 
arrest  the  passing  clouds,  and  condense  them  into  rain  so  often  that  the  lands 
are  never  parched  or  dry.  Snow  rarely  lingers  long  there,  and  even  in  a  hard 
winter  the  mountain  herbage  and  ferns  are  readily  made  into  hay. ' 


LVII. 

■ 

ASHEVILLE  —  THE     FRENCH     BROAD     VALLEY — THE     ASCENT     OF 

MOUNT     MITCHELL. 

ON  a  bright  Sunday  we  descended  toward  the  course  of  the  Tuckaseege, 
and  a  violent  storm  delayed  us  at  a  lowly  cabin,  near  the  path  by  which 
a  visitor  now  and  then  penetrates  to  Tuckaseege  cataract.  According  to  the 
custom  of  the  country,  we  carried  our  saddles  into  the  porch  and  sat  down  on 
them  to  talk  with  the  residents.  The  tall,  lean,  sickly  farmer,  clad  in  a  home- 
spun pair  of  trowsers  and  a  flax  shirt,  with  the  omnipresent  gray  slouched  hat, 
minus  rim,  drawn  down  over  his  forehead,  courteously  greeted  us,  and  volun- 
teered to  direct  us  to  the  falls,  though  he  "  was  powerful  afeard  of  snakes." 

Buttermilk  and  biscuit  were  served  ;  we  conversed  with  the  farmer  on  his 
condition.  He  cultivated  a  small  farm,  like  most  of  the  neighbors  in  moderate 
circumstances;  only  grew  corn  enough  for  his  own  support;  "did  n't  reckon  he 
should  stay  thar  long ;  war  n't  no  schools,  and  he  reckoned  his  children  needed 
larnin' ;  schools  never  was  handy  ;  too  many  miles  away."  There  was  very  little 
money  in  all  the  region  round  about ;  farmers  rarely  saw  fifty  dollars  in  cash  from 
year  to  year ;  the  few  things  which  they  needed  from  the  outside  world  they  got 
by  barter.  The  children  were,  as  a  rule,  mainly  occupied  in  minding  the  innu- 
merous  pigs  about  the  cabin,  and  caring  for  the  stock.  The  farmer  thought 
sheep-raising  would  be  "powerful  peart,"  if  folks  had  a  little  more  capital  to 
begin  on ;  thought  a  man  might  get  well-to-do  in  a  year  or  two  by  such  invest- 
ment. 

He  welcomed  the  mineral  movement  gladly;  reckoned  may  be  we  could  send 
him  some  one  to  buy  his  farm,  and  let  him  get  to  a  more  thickly  settled  region ; 
but  seemed  more  cheerful  when  we  suggested  that  emigrants  might  come  in  and 
settle  up  the  country,  bringing  a  demand  for  schools  with  them.  "  He  reckoned 
there  war  n't  no  Ku-Klux  these  days ;  never  knew  nothin'  on  'em.  Heerd 
nothin'  furder  from  'em  sence  the  break-up." 

The  housewife  was  smoking  her  corn-cob  pipe,  and  sitting  rather  disconso- 
lately before  the  fire-place,  warming  her  thin  hands  by  the  few  coals  remaining 
in  the  ashes.  The  rain  dripped  in  through  the  roof,  and  the  children  were  hud- 
dled mutely  together  where  it  could  not  reach  them.  The  furnishings  were,  as 
everywhere  among  the  poorer  classes  in  the  mountains,  of  the  plainest  character. 
But  the  log  barns  were  amply  provisioned  ;  stock  looked  well,  and  a  few  sheep 
and  goats  were  amicably  grouped  under  the  shed. 

The  rain  had  so  submerged  the  country  that  we  gave  up  a  visit  to  the 
cataract,  said  to  be  superior  to  the  two  other  falls  we  had  seen ;  and,  as  we  rode 


504 


THE      COPPER      REGION ASHEVILLE. 


on,  there  came  a  pause  in  the  shower.  Presently  we  overtook  a  party  of  mount- 
aineers going  to  church.  The  women,  perched  on  the  horses  behind  the  men, 
peered  curiously  at  us  from  beneath  their  large  sun-bonnets,  and  the  men  talked 
cheerily.  The  church,  which  we  passed,  was  ruder  than  Parson  Caton's  in  Ten- 
nessee. It  was  merely  a  log-cabin,  inside  which  benches  were  placed.  The 
congregation  was  singing  a  quaint  hymn  as  we  rode  by,  and  a  few  men,  for  whom 
there  was  no  room  inside,  lounged  near  the  "saplings  where  their  horses  were 
hitched,  listening  intently. 

The  copper  region  of  Jackson  county  is  fascinatingly  beautiful.  While  there 
is  the  same  tropical  richness  of  foliage  which  distinguishes  the  other  counties, 
there  is  a  greater  wealth  of  stream-side  loveliness ;  there  are  dozens  of  foamy 
creeks  and  by-ways,  overhung  with  vines. 

The  hills  are  admirably  fertile  in  the  vicinity  of  the  Way-ye-hutta  and  Cul- 
lowhee  copper  mines,  and  many  of  the  vineyards  are  exquisitely  cultivated. 
The  Cullowhee  mountain  is  charming;  no  region  in  the  South  can  furnish 
stronger  attractions  for  emigrants.  "  Look  at  that  valley,"  said  an  English 
resident  to  me,  "  a  few  farmers  from  England,  with  their  system  of  small  farms 
and  careful  cultivation,  would  make  this  an  Eden."     And  he  did  not  exaggerate. 


Asheville,  North  Carolina,  from  "Beaucatcher  Knob." 

Give  all  that  section  immigration,  and  railroads  cannot  be  kept  out  of  it,  even 
by  the  rascality  of  such  gigantic  swindles  as  have  been  forced  upon  North 
Carolina.  The  copper  mines  in  Jackson  were  worked  extensively  before  the 
war,  and  Northern  capital  and  shrewd  English  mining  experience  are  once  more 
developing  them. 

The  ore  is  "  hauled,"  as  the  North  Carolinians  say,  more  than  forty  miles 
over  a  wagon  road.  The  Blue  Ridge  tracts  and  the  lands  in  Jackson  county 
demand  the  attention  of  such  men  as  Joseph  Arch  and  other  English  agitators  of 
the  agricultural  revolution  in  Great  Britain.  Vast  tracts  of  the  lands  in  Western 
North  Carolina  can  be  sold  to  colonists  or  capitalists  at  from  one  to  two  dollars 
per  acre. 

Some  days  later,  the  Judge  enthusiastically  pointed  out  to  us  the  beauties 
of  Asheville,  the  Mecca  of  the  North  Carolina  mountaineer.  We  had  journeyed 
thither  down  the  valley  of  the  Pigeon  river, — a  tranquil  stream,  with  flour-mills 


THE      ATTRACTIONS      OF     ASHEV1LLE.  505 

here  and  there  perched  in  cozy  nooks  along  its  banks.  A  thirty  mile  wagon 
ride  from  Waynesville  landed  us  at  the  great  white  "  Eagle  Hotel,"  from  whose 
doors  the  Asheville  stages  ply  over  all  the  roads  west  of  the  Blue  Ridge.  In  the 
valley  where  Asheville  lies  the  capricious  "  French  Broad"  receives  into  its  noble 
channel  the  beautiful  Swannanoa,  pearl  of  North  Carolinian  rivers. 

Around  the  little  city,  which  now  boasts  a  population  of  2,500  people,  are 
grouped  many  noticeable  hills;  out  of  the  valley  of  "Hommony"  creek  sombre 
Mount  Pisgah  rises  like  a  frowning  giant,  and  from  the  town  the  distant  summits 
of  the  Balsam  range\may  be  faintly  discerned.  From  "  Beaucatcher  Knob,"  the 
site  of  a  Confederate  fort,  overhanging  Asheville,  the  looker  toward  the  south- 
west will  see  half-a-hundred  peaks  shooting  sky  ward ;  while  in  the  foreground 
lies  the  oddly-shaped  town,  with  the  rich  green  fields  along  the  French  Broad- 
beyond  it.  Asheville  Court- House  stands  nearly  2,250  feet  above  the  level  of  the 
sea ;  and  the  climate  of  all  the  adjacent  region  is  mild,  dry,  and  full  of  salvation 
for  consumptives.  The  hotels,  and  many  of  the  cheery  and  comfortable  farm- 
houses are  in  summer  crowded  with  visitors,  from  the  East  and  West ;  and  the 
local  society  is  charmingly  cordial  and  agreeable. 

Buncombe  county,  of  which  Asheville  is  the  central  and  chief  town,  was 
named  after  Colonel  Edward  Buncombe,  a  good  revolutionary  soldier  and 
patriot;  and  its  name  has  become  familiar  to  us  in  the  quaint  saying  so  often  used 
in  the  political  world,  "He's  only  talking  for  Buncombe,"  when  a  legislator  is 
especially  fervent  in  aid  of  some  local  project.  At  Asheville,  we  were  once 
more  in  a  region  of  wooden  and  brick  houses,  banks,  hotels  and  streets ;  and 
although  still  some  distance  from  any  railroad,  felt  as  if  we  had  a  hold  upon  the 
outer  world. 

Asheville  has  heretofore  been  comparatively  unknown.  Enthusiastic  inva- 
lids, who  there  regained  their  health,  have  from  time  to  time  sung  its  charms, 
but  the  little  town,  situated  250  miles  from  the  State  capital,  has  only  a  fleeting 
fame.  The  war  brought  it  now  and  then  into  notice ;  General  Stoneman,  with 
his  command,  fought  his  way  through  the  passes  to  Waynesville,  and  at  a  short 
distance  from  Asheville  the  last  Confederate  battle  east  of  the  Mississippi 
occurred. 

The  town  has  grown  steadily  and  remarkably  since  the  war,  and  now  has 
banks,  good  churches,  well-furnished  stores,  three  newspapers,  and  ample  hotels ; 
while  in  the  vicinity  the  tobacco  which  grows  so  abundantly  in  Buncombe  is 
prepared  for  the  market,  and  great  quantities  of  cheese  are  annually  manufac- 
tured. Beautiful  natural  parks  surround  it ;  superb  oaks  cast  their  shadows  on 
greenest  of  lawns,  and  noble  maples,  ash  and  walnuts  border  the  romantic  road- 
way. A  few  miles  from  the  town's  centre  are  excellent  white  sulphur  springs, 
from  which  a  variety  of  exquisite  views  are  to  be  had,  and  only  nine  miles  north 
of  the  town,  are  the  so-called  "  Million  Springs,"  beautifully  situated  in  a  cave 
between  two  ranges  of  mountains,  where  sulphur  and  chalybeate  waters  may  be 
had  in  profusion. 

The  town  of  Asheville  will  in  future  be  the  railroad  centre  of  Western  North 
Carolina,  and  must  grow  to  be  a  large  and  flourishing  city.      The  present  pov- 


5o6 


WESTERN      NORTH      CAROLINA      RAILROADS. 


erty  of  the  section  as  to  railroad  communication  is  largely  due  to  the  discour- 
agement consequent  on  the  manner  in  which  the  confidence  of  those  subscribing 
to  the  principal  enterprise  has  been  betrayed.  The  unfinished  embankments, 
the  half-built  culverts  and  arches  of  the  Western  North  Carolina  railroad,  which 
are  to  be  seen  in  many  of  the  western  counties,  are  monuments  to  the  rapacity 
and  meanness  of  a  few  men  in  whom  those  counties  placed  confidence. 

The  plan  of  this  railroad  is  a  fine  one,  and  would  soon  develop  the  noble 
mountain  country  into  a  very  wealthy  section.  It  proposed  to  supply  a  route 
from  Salisbury,  North  Carolina,  to  Asheville,  and  thence  by  two  lines  to  give 
advantageous  outlets.  One  of  these  was  to  run  down  the  valley  of  the  French 
Broad  river  to  "Paint  Rock,"  on  the  Tennessee  line,  connecting  with  the  Cin- 
cinnati, Cumberland  Gap,  and  Charleston  railroad,  leading  to  Morristown,  Ten- 
nessee, which  would  have  connections  with  the  through  route  from  New  York 
to  New  Orleans,  at  Morristown,  and  would  complete  the  great  air  line  from 
Charleston,  in  South  Carolina,  to  Cincinnati  in  Ohio,  by  connecting  at  Lexington 


View  near  Warm  Springs,  on  the  French  Broad  River.     [Page  507.] 

or  Paris,  in  Kentucky,  with  the  Kentucky  Central  road.  The  other  outlet  was  to 
be  by  the  main  line  passing  due  wrest  from  Asheville  through  the  western  counties 
to  Ducktown,  in  Cherokee  county,  and  thence  on  to  Cleveland  in  Tennessee, 
whence  it  is  but  a  short  distance  to  Chattanooga.  Thus  the  gates  of  this  now 
almost  unknown  region  would  be  unlocked,  and  the  best  sections  penetrated  by 
rail  routes.  But  the  work  lies  incomplete  under  the  very  eyes  of  the  hard-work- 
ing mountaineers  who  have  been  swindled.  The  money  which  they  subscribed 
has  been  spirited  away,  and  still  the  eastern  division  of  the  road  has  only  reached 
Old  Fort,  twenty-five  miles  from  Asheville. 

The  other  routes  are  few  and  insufficient.  The  "  Central  North  Carolina," 
formerly  the  Wilmington,  Charlotte,  and  Rutherford  railroad,  is  to  run  from  Wil- 
mington on  the  coast  via  Wadesboro',  Charlotte,  and  Lincolnton  to  Cherryville, 
and  is  intended  to  reach  Asheville,  but  has  eighty-five  miles  yet  to  build  from 
Cherryville. 


ALONG     THE      FRENCH      BROAD      RIVER.  .     507 

The  Union  and  Spartanburg  railroad,  leading  from  Alston,  in  South  Carolina, 
to  the  Greenville  and  Columbia  route,  twenty-five  miles  north  of  Columbia,  is  to 
be  extended  to  Asheville,  a  distance  of  seventy-four  miles,  crossing  the  Blue 
Ridge  at  Butt  Mountain  Gap;  and  the  Laurens  and  Asheville  Railroad  Company 
intends  to  build  a  road  from  Laurensville  via  Greenville,  in  South  Carolina,  to 
Asheville,  which  will  furnish  a  means  of  connection  with  the  Atlanta  and  Rich- 
mond Air  Line. 

The  importance  of  the  extension,  which  would  give  a  through  direct  line  from 
Cincinnati  to  Charleston,  can  hardly  be  overestimated.  The  links  still  to  be 
built  would  develop  not  only  a  rich,  but  a  wildly  romantic  and  picturesque 
country.  The  valley  of  the  French  Broad  river  conforms  with  perfect  accuracy 
to  the  general  direction  of  an  air  line  between  the  two  cities. 

And  what  a  valley  it  is  !  The  forty-four  miles  from  Asheville  to  Wolf  creek 
form  one  of  the  most  delightful  of  mountain  journeys.  The  rugged  wagon  road 
runs  close  to  the  river's  banks  all  the  way  to  Warm  Springs,  a  charming  watering- 
place  a  short  distance  from  the  Tennessee  line.  As  you  penetrate  the  valley  the 
river  grows  more  and  more  turbulent;  its  broad  current  now  dashes  into  breakers 
and  foam-flakes,  as  it  beats  against  the  myriads  of  rocks  set  in  the  channel-bed; 
now  twirls  and  eddies  around  the  masses  of  drift-wood  washed  down  from  the 
sides  of  the  gigantic  mountains  which  rise  almost  perpendicularly  from  the  tiny 
stretches  of  sand  at  the  water's  edge;  now,  deep  and  black,  or  in  stormy  weather 
yellow  and  muddy,  it  flows  in  a  strong,  steady  current  beside  banks  where  the 
trees  are  grouped  in  beautiful  forms,  creating  foregrounds  over  which  the  artist's 
eye  lovingly  lingers. 

The  Indians  named  the  French  Broad  "  the  racing  river ;  "  and,  as  it  hurls  its 
wavelets  around  the  corner  of  some  islet  or  promontory,  one  sees  how  faithfully 
the  name  describes  the  stream.  Each  separate  drop  of  water  seems  to  be  racing 
with  every  other.  A  party  of  American  hunters  named  the  stream  after  their 
captain,  French,  during  the  days  of  early  settlement,  and  from  "French's  Broad" 
the  name  finally  assumed  its  present  form. 

One  can  hear  the  voice  of  the  river  always  crying  among  the  cliffs,  and  moan- 
ing and  sighing  as  it  laps  the  low  banks  in  the  narrow  gorge.  It  was  the  rare 
good  fortune  of  our  party  to  journey  beside  the  stream  during  a  terrific  storm. 
As  we  reached  the  little  town  of  Marshall, — a  few  white  buildings  grouped 
beneath  immense  cliffs, —  a  wild  tempest  of  wind  and  rain,  which  snapped  the 
locusts  like  paper  twine,  blew  down  oaks,  made  "land  slides,"  and  prostrated  the 
crops,  came  through  the  valley ;  and  then  the  roar  of  the  river  was  sublime. 

Straggling  along  in  the  storm,  we  gave  ourselves  completely  up  to  the  gran- 
deur of  the  occasion.  The  creeks  which  came  down  from  the  rocks  were  so 
swollen  that  they  would  have  carried  the  stoutest  horse  out  into  the  wild  chaos 
of  the  dashing  and  leaping  stream,  and  drowned  him  in  the  mysterious  eddies. 

Night  came,  and  we  slept  in  a  little  farm-house,  with  the  river  singing  its 
delicious  songs  of  unrest  and  impatience  at  its  mountain  bounds  in  our  ears. 
Skillful  fording  in  the  morning  enabled  us  to  pursue  our  journey  along  the 
washed-out  road,  where  beetling  crags  almost  shut  the  light;  where  there  was 


5o8 


LOVER   S      LEAP  —  WARM     SPRINGS  —  PAINT     ROCK. 


not  room  for  two  carriages  abreast,  and  some  stone  monarch  of  the  glen  leaned 
toward  the  stream's  edge  as  if  just  about  to  topple  downward.  For  miles  the 
rocks  towered  up  loftily,  and  miniature  torrents  ran  down  their  sides,  rippling 
across  the  road  into  the  river,  upon  whose  farther  bank  there  was  no  refuge  what- 
ever; only  the  sheer  rock  with  its  coat- 
ing of  foliage ;  the  tangled  thickets  on 
the  height ;  the  gleam  of  the  streamlet 
piercing  its  way  athwart  the  stones 
1,500  feet  in  air  ! 

The  traveler  who  is  not  strongly 
moved  by  his  first  gaze  upon  this  val- 
ley must  be  indeed  blase.  The  ap- 
proaches to  Warm  Springs  exceed  in 
grandeur  any  other  portion  of  the 
gorge.  Pyramidal  hills  rise  on  either 
hand ;  the  soft  breeze  of  the  south 
brings  perfume  from  the  borders  of 
little  river  lakes,  where  the  current 
has  set  backward,  and  is  held  in  place 
by  banks  covered  with  delicate  flowers. 
Mountain  Island,"  two  miles  from 
the  Springs,  is  a  hilly  islet  in  the  im- 
petuous stream;  its  shores  and  its 
slopes  are  rich  in  beauty,  carpeted  with 
evergreens,  and  all  the  colors  of  the 
rich  North  Carolinian  flora.  Below 
it  the  river  becomes  smooth,  and  moves  majestically,  only  to  break  up  anew  into 
sparkling  and  fantastic  cascades  Suddenly  leaving  the  looming  mountains,  with 
the  famous  rock  "Lover's  Leap"  on  the  right,  one  finds  that  the  south-west 
bank  of  the  river  recedes,  and  gives  place  to  a  level  plain,  in  whose  centre  is  a 
beautiful  grove.  From  this  clump  of  trees  peer  out  the  white  pillars  of  the 
Warm  Springs  Hotel.  It  is  not  far  from  the  banks  of  the  French  Broad,  which 
there  is  more  than  400  feet  wide,  and  traversed  by  a  high  bridge. 

The  Warm  Springs  were  discovered  late  in  the  last  century  by  some  advent- 
urous scouts,  who  had  penetrated  farther  than  was  prudent  into  the  then  Indian 
country.  The  springs  boil  up  from  the  margins  of  the  river,  and  of  "  Spring 
Creek,"  and  have  a  temperature  of  105  degrees.  Thither  the  rheumatic,  and 
those  afflicted  with  kindred  diseases,  repair  yearly  in  large  numbers,  and  find 
speedy  relief.  From  a  spacious  lawn  one  can  look  up-river  at  massive  cliffs 
and  mountains  clad  in  rich  foliage;  and  for  miles  and  miles  around  there  is  a 
succession  of  quaint  and  oddly  shaped  rocks.  Nine  miles  beyond  the  Springs 
the  railroad  from  Wolf  creek  gives  prompt  connection  with  the  through  line  to 
New  York. 

Five  miles  below,  on  the  Tennessee  line,  is  the  "Paint  Rock,"  200  feet  high, 
a.  titanic  mass  of  stone  whose  face  is  marked  as  with  red  paint,  and  which    seems 


Lover's  Leap,  French  Broad  River,  Western 
North  Carolina. 


"THE      CHIMNEYS" THE      SWANNANOA. 


509 


to  have  been  pounded  by  some  terrible  Thor- hammer  into  multitudinous  frag- 
ments, some  of  which  overhang  the  highway.  Not  far  from  this  point  one  comes 
also  to  the  "  Chimneys," — the  unpoetic  name  given  to  jagged  stone  monuments 
rising  400  feet  into  the  air,  serene,  awful,  gigantic,  while  the  "  racing  river"  cries 
and  caracoles  at  their  bases.  Hundreds,  nay,  thousands  of  fragments,  shaped  like 
diamonds,  or  squares,  of  round  flint  and  sandstone,  and  almost  every  other  kind 
of  stone,  lie  scattered  below,  as  though  hurled  down  by  a  thunderbolt;  and 
swarms  of  turkey-buzzards  hover  in  and  out  among  the  crags. 

Buncombe  county  is  very  fertile ;  the  tobacco  raised  there  has  frequently 
taken  the  first  and  second  premiums  at  the  Virginia  State  fair.  Fruit  culture 
prospers;  iron  ores  crop  out  here  and  there.  Stock-raising  is  one  of  the  chief 
occupations  of  the  wealthier  residents.  Beaufort  harbor  will  be  Asheville's 
nearest  port,  and  a  very  convenient  one,  if  ever  the  Western  North  Carolina  rail- 
road is  completed.      Manufacturing  is  needed,  and  would  find  superior  advan- 


View  on  the  Swannanoa  River,  near  Asheville,  Western  North  Carolina. 

tages,  in  all  the  region  round  about  Asheville.  In  the  valley  of  the  French 
Broad  there  are  many  admirable  mill  sites,  the  river  at  Asheville  being  quite  as 
large  as  the  Merrimac  at  Lowell,  in  Massachusetts.  The  water  power  is  generally 
superb,  because  most  of  the  mountain  streams,  before  they  flow  out  into  Tennes- 
see, have  a  fall  of  1,000  feet.  Timber  is  abundant,  and  when  the  railroad  comes, 
it  will  run  through  finely-timbered  regions. 

Our  journey  along  the  Swannanoa  was  a  revelation.  We  missed  the  noisy 
grandeur  of  the  French  Broad  valley,  but  we  found  ample  compensation  in  the 
quiet  loveliness  of  the  stream  which  the  reverent  Indian  named  "beautiful." 
Four  miles  from  Asheville,  going  north-eastward,  toward  the  Black  mountains, 
we  reached  the  river,  and  followed  its  placid  current  through  a  beautifully-culti- 
vated valley.  A  rich  carpet  of  green  covered  its  banks,  and  there  was  the  same 
charming  effect  produced  by  the  trailing  of  the  vines  over  the  trees  which  we 
had  noticed  in  the  mountains. 
33 


5io 


"PATTON'S" CLIMBING      MOUNT      MITCHELL. 


First  Peep  at  Pattern's. 


The  river  was  sometimes  deeply  dark  in  color ;  now  and  then  faintly  blue  or 
purple,  as  the  sunshine  played  upon  it  through  the  thickets ;  here  and  there  we 
came  to  a  place  where  it  had  formed  a  little  lake,  across  which  a  rustic  bridge 
was  thrown,  and   where   one  of  the   long,   slender  canoes   of  the   country  was 

moored  to  a  sapling;  now,  where  some 
rich  farmer's  mansion  stood  on  a 
lawn,  dotted  with  oaks  and  hickories  ; 
now,  where  we  caught  a  glimpse  of 
the  distant  Potato  Top  mountain ; 
now,  where  an  old  mill  was  half 
hidden  under  clusters  of  azaleas  and 
the    low -laurels. 

The  summit  of  the  Black  mount- 
ains is  the  highest  point  in  the  United 
States  east  of  the  Mississippi  river,  and 
the  rugged  range,  clad  in  its  garments 
of  balsam  and  moss,  glorious  with  its 
vistas  of  apparently  endless  hills  and 
fancifully  -  shaped  valleys,  is  the  chief 
pride  of  the  North  Carolinian  mount- 
aineer. Our  party  left  Asheville  late 
one  bright  morning,  sped  along  the 
Swannanoa  to  "Alexander's,"  a  good  halting-point,  seven  or  eight  miles  from 
the  mountain's  foot,  and  then  pushed  on  to  Patton's,  the  collection  of  humble 
cabins  nestled  at  the  very  base  of  the  chain  of  peaks.  Our  German  companion 
sang  his  merriest  songs  that  afternoon,  and  the  Judge's  cheery  halloo  was  heard 
at  every  mile,  for  the  loveliest  phases  of  nature  gave  us  their  inspiration. 

As  we  approached  Patton's,  the  long  ridges  of  "Craggy"  loomed  up  like 
ramparts  to  the .  eastward,  and  the  sun  tinged  the  sky  above  them  crimson  and 
purple.  The  music  from  the  ripples  of  the  fork  of  the  Swannanoa,  which  we 
"were  now  ascending,  drifted  on  the  evening  air ;  the  kalmias,  the  azaleas,  and  the 
honeysuckles,  sent  forth  their  perfumes ;  the  wood-choppers,  their  feet  well  pro- 
tected against  the  snakes  by  stout  boots,  were  strolling  supperward,  and  gave  us 
hearty  good  evenings ;  the  cow-bells  tinkled  musically,  and  in  a  corner  of  Pat- 
ton's yard  a  mountain  smith  was  clanging  his  hammer  against  his  anvil,  seemingly 
keeping  time  with  the  refrain  to  which  all  nature  was  moved.  The  evening  was 
still  and  warm,  even  in  that  elevated  region.  While  some  of  us  remained  in  the 
cabin  below  and  listened  to  tales  of  Black  Mountain  adventure,  the  aspiring 
Jonas,  with  a  companion,  pushed  on  a  few  miles  beyond,  that  he  might  see  sun- 
rise from  the  heights,  even  though  he  had  to  sleep  in  a  crazy  and  decaying  house 
on  the  edge  of  a  dizzy  cliff,  with  the  floor  for  his  bed  and  his  saddle  for  a  pillow. 
It  is  twelve  miles  from  Patton's  to  the  summit  of  Mitchell's  Peak,  and  the 
ascent,  which  is  very  arduous,  is  usually  broken  by  stop  at  the  "  Mountain 
House,"  four  miles  from  the  foot,  and  another  at  the  point  where  the  Govern- 
ment once  maintained  an  observatory,  on  a  rock  6,578  feet  high,  and  three  miles 


/ 


/ 


AT     THE     "MOUNTAIN      HOUSE 


511 


from  the  topmost  height,  which  rises  suddenly  from  the  range,  a  mass  of  ragged 
projections,  covered  with  deadened  tree-trunks. 

At  early  dawn  we  were  on  our  road  to  the  Mountain  House,  at  first  through 
thickets,  then  along  a  creek-bed,  where  the  cautious  mountain-horses  walked  with 
the  greatest  difficulty ;  now  fording  a  creek  twenty  times  in  half  an  hour,  now 
bending  as  we  came  to  tree-trunks  half-fallen  across  the  trail.  A  slip  upon  a 
smooth  stone  frightened  one  of  the  horses  so  that  he  stood  still  and  trembled 
for  a  moment,  so  well  did  he  realize  the  result  of  a  fall  or  roll  backward ;  some- 
times the  animals  would  stand  and  listen,  with  their  ears  ominously  cocked  as 
if  watching  for  snakes ;  often  they  paused  as  if  in  mute  despair  at  the  task 
before  them. 

But  after  an  hour  and  a-half  of  this  laborious  climbing,  during  which  we 
had  ascended  at  least  1,500  feet,  we  heard  the  halloo  of  Jonas  and  his  compan- 
ions, and  scrambling  up  the  track  of  a  little  water-course,  came  out  upon  the 
plateau  on  whose  edge  stands  the  Mountain  House. 

The  "  house  "  is  a  small  Swiss  cottage,  once  solidly  built  of  stout  beams,  but 
now  fast  decaying.  It  was  built  by  William  Patton,  a  wealthy  citizen  of  Charles- 
ton, and  before  the  war  was  often  the  resort  of  gay  parties,  who  dined  merrily  on 
the  cliff's  verge,  and  saluted  the  sunset  with  champagne.  It  stands  but  a  few 
yards  from  the  edge  of  the  Balsam  growth,  where  the  vegetation  changes  and  the 
atmosphere  is  rarer  than  below.  It  is  5,460  feet  above  the  sea-level  at  the 
point  in  front  of  the 
Mountain  House,  where  one 
looks  down  into  the  valley, 
and  sees  the  forest-clad 
ridges  creeping  below  him 
for  miles ;  notes  the  twin 
peaks  of  Craggy  and  their 
naked  tops;  then  turns 
in  wonder  to  the  wood 
above  him,  and  searches 
in  vain  for  the  peaks  be- 
yond. While  at  the  win- 
dows of  the  Mountain 
House  we  seemed  to  be 
gazing  from  mid- air  down 
upon  the  Blue  Ridge. 
The  illusion  was  perfect. 
Below  us  the  mists  were 
rising  solemnly  and  slowly; 
peak  after  peak  was  unveil- 
ed ;  vast  horizons  dawned 
upon  us ;  we  seemed  to 
have  risen  above  the  world.  We  turned  from  this  view  of  the  valleys  and 
entered  the  balsam  thickets,  pushing  eagerly  forward  to  Mount  Mitchell. 


The  "Mountain  House,"  on  the  way  to  Mount  Mitchell's  Summit. 


512 


THE     OUTLOOK     FROM      MOUNT      MITCHELL. 


And  now  we  came  into  the  region  of  the  pink  and  scarlet  rhododendrons. 
Whenever  there  was  an  opening  in  the  trees  the  hill-side  was  aflame  with 
them.  Masses  of  their  stout  bushes  hung  along  our  path,  and  showered  the 
fragile  red  blossoms  upon  us.  The  white  mountain  laurel,  too,  was  omni- 
present, but  the  scarlet  banner  usurped  the  greatest  space. 

When  we  came  to  a  narrow  trail,  where  slippery  rocks  confronted  us,  and 
ragged  balsam-trunks  compelled  us  to  clamber  over  dangerous  crags,  we 
found  the  way  strewn  with 
a  crimson  carpet  after  our 
horses  had  struggled 
through.  Here,  too,  were 
masses  of  evergreen,  and 
red -pointed  mosses,  and 
the  azaleas  again  along 
the  border  of  streamlets, 
and  purple  rosebay  and 
the  tall  grasses  in  the  clear- 
ings, in  whose  midst  nes- 
tled timorously  tiny  white 
blossoms  and  ground 
berries. 

To    climb   Vesuvius   is 
no  more   difficult   than  to 
scale  the  Black  mountain, 
for  although  one  can  reach 
the   latter   on  horseback,    he 
danger  of  breaking  his  limbs  and  those  of  his 
horse  on  the  rough  pathway.     By  the  time 
we  had  reached  "Mount  Mitchell"  and  seated 
ourselves  upon  its  rocks,  our  horses  were  as 
thoroughly  enthusiastic  as  we  were,  and  peered 
out  over  the    crags  with  genuine  curiosity. 

From  Mount  Mitchell  we  saw  that  we 
were  upon  a  centre  from  whence  radiated  several  mountain  chains. 
To  the  south  we  could  see  even  as  far  as  the  Cumberland  line,  and 
could  readily  discern  the  "  Bald  "  mountain  and  our  old  friend 
the  Smoky;  while  nearer  in  the  same  direction,  we  noted  the  Bal- 
sam range.  Sweeping  inward  from  the  north-east  coast  were  the  long  ridges  of 
the  Alleghanies ;  on  the  north  the  chain  of  the  Black  culminated  in  a  fantastic 
rock  pile ;  while  on  the  south  the  ridges  of  Craggy  once  more  stood  revealed. 

To  the  east  we  could  overlook  the  plains  of  North  and  South  Carolina ;  on 
the  north-east  we  saw  Table  Rock  and  the  "Hawk  Bill,"  twin  mountains,  piercing 
the  clouds;  while  beyond  them  rose  the  abrupt  "Grandfather"  mountain,  and 
the  bluff  of  the  Roan.  On  the  south  were  the  high  peaks  of  the  Alleghanies,  the 
Pinnacles,  Rocky  Knob,  Gray  Beard,  Bear  Wallow,  and  Sugar  Loaf. 


Mitchell's    high    peak. 


513 


Another  hour  and  a-half  of  climbing;  then,  dashing  through  a  clearing,  we 
suddenly  saw  above  us  a  crag  200  feet  high,  with  a  stone-strewn  path  leading  up 
it.  Our  horses  sprang  to  their  risky  task  ;  they  rushed  up  the  ascent, — slipped, 
caught  against  the  edges  of  the  stones,  snorted  with  fear,  then  laid  back  their 
ears  and  gave  a  final  leap,  and  we  were  on  Mitchell's  high  peak,  utterly  above 
Alleghanies,  Blue  Ridge,  or  Mount  Washington.  Our  horses'  ears  brushed  the 
clouds.     In  a  few  moments  we  were  at  Mitchell's  grave. 

Here  we  were  above  the  rhododendrons,  and  only  a  gnarled  and  stunted 
growth  sprang  up.  The  trees  were  nearly  all  dead ;  those  still  alive  seemed 
lonely  and  miserable.  The  rude  grave  of  the  explorer,  with  the  four  rough 
slabs  placed  around  it,  recalled  the  history  of  the  man,  and  the  origin  of  the 
peak's  name. 

The  Rev.  Dr.  Elisha  Mitchell,  a  native  of  Connecticut,  graduate  of  Yale 
and  an  eminent  professor  in  the  University  of  North  Carolina,  established  the 


The  Judge  climbing  Mitchell's  High  Peak. 

fact  by  measurements,  made  from  1835  to  1844,  that  the  Black  was  the  highest 
range  east  of  the  Rocky  mountains  in  the  United  States.  He  grew  very  much 
to  love  the  work  of  studying  these  heights,  and  spent  weeks  in  wandering  alone 
among  them.  The  rough  mountaineers  learned  to  revere  him,  and  he  became 
as  skillful  a  woodsman  as  any  of  them. 

In  June  of  1857,  after  accomplishing  some  difficult  surveys,  and,  as  it  is 
supposed,  having  ascended  the  pinnacle  which  now  bears  his  name,  he  was 
descending  into  Yancey  county,  when,  overtaken  by  night  and  a  blinding  storm, 


514  THE     GRAVE     OF     DR.      MITCHELL. 

he  strayed  over  a  precipice  on  "Sugar  Camp"  creek,  and  was  discovered  some 
days  afterward,  dead,  at  the  bottom  of  a  waterfall,  his  body  perfectly  preserved 
in  the  limpid  pool.  His  friends  the  mountaineers,  who  mourned  his  loss  bitterly, 
buried  him  in  Asheville;  but  a  year  later  his  remains  were  carried  to  the  mount- 
ain top  and  there  placed  in  a  grave  among  the  rocks  he  had  loved  so  well. 

Near  the  grave  the  Government  has  established  a  signal-house,  where  two 
brave  fellows  dare  the  storms  which  occur  almost  daily.  The  anger  of  the 
heavens,  as  witnessed  from  this  stony  perch  in  mid-air,  is  frightful  to  contem- 
plate, and  many  a  day  the  lonely  men  have  expected  to  see  their  only  shelter 
hurled  down  into  the  ravines  below. 

The  view  from  the  topmost  peak  is  similar,  in  most  respects,  to  that  from 
lower  Mount  Mitchell;  but  the  effect  is  more  grand  and  imposing,  and  the 
mountains  to  the  south  and  east  seem  to  stand  out  in  bolder  relief.     A  tremu- 


Signal  -  Station  and  "Mitchell's  Grave,"  Summit  of  the  Black  Mountains. 

lous  mist  from  time  to  time  hung  about  us ;  the  clouds  now  and  then  shut  the 
lower  world  from  our  vision,  and  we  seemed  standing  on  a  narrow  precipice, 
toward  whose  edges  we  dared  not  venture. 

As  we  descended,  that  afternoon,  the  pheasant  strutted  across  our  path ;  the 
cross-bill  turned  his  head  archly  to  look  at  us ;  the  mountain  boomer  nervously 
skipped  from  tree  to  tree ;  the  rocks  seemed  ablaze  as  we  approached  the 
rhododendron  thickets ;  the  brooks  rippled  never  so  musically,  and  the  azalea's 
perfume  was  sweeter  than  ever  before. 

Each  member  of  the  party,  dropping  bridle-rein  on  his  weary  horse's  neck, 
as  we  came  once  more  into  the  open  space  where  stands  the  "  Mountain  House," 
and  looked  down  thousands  of  feet  into  the  yawning  valley;  as  the  peace  and 
silence,  and  eternal  grandeur  of  the  scene  ripened  in  his  soul,  involuntarily  bared 
his  head  in  reverence.      Goethe  was  right : 

"On  every  height  there  lies  repose." 


LVIIL 

THE     SOUTH     CAROLINA     MOUNTAINS — THE     CASCADES  AND 
PEAKS     OF     NORTHERN     GEORGIA. 

THE  new  link  in  the  New  York  and  New  Orleans  Air  Line,  connecting 
Charlotte  in  North  Carolina  with  Augusta  in  Georgia,  had  been  finished 
but  a  few  days  when  I  passed  over  it.  This  road,  which  gives  the  most  direct 
route  from  Atlanta  to  Richmond,  opens  up  a  large  portion  of  North-eastern 
Georgia,  and  traverses  a  rich  mineral  region  for  600  miles. 

The  country  between  Charlotte  and  Greenville  in  South  Carolina  is  inter- 
esting, though  still  in  the  rough.  The  better  class  of  people  all  through  this 
section,  and  especially  in  North  Carolina,  possess  and  manifest  that  boldness  and 
independence  of  spirit  which  made  the  colony  the  first  of  the  original  thirteen 
to  claim  independence,  and  prompted  the  settlers  on  the  Cape  Fear  river  to 
refuse  a  landing  to  the  stamps  brought  from  England  in  one  of  King  George's 
sloops -of- war.  There  is  a  good  deal  of  ignorance  and  prejudice  among  the  low 
class  of  whites ;  they  are  hardly  the  stuff  out  of  which  the  old  heroes  were 
made. 

The  mountain  region  of  South  Carolina,  lying  between  North  Carolina  and 
Georgia,  contains  some  of  the  most  exquisite  scenery  in  the  United  States. 
Entering  it  from  Charlotte,  one  passes  Spartanburg  and  near  the  site  of  the 
famous  battle  of  King's  Mountain,  and  following  the  Air  Line  may  pause  at 
the  busy  town  of  Greenville. 

I  found  there  more  activity  and  less  embarrassment  on  account  of  the  dis- 
tressing political  situation  than  anywhere  else  in  South  Carolina  south  of  Colum- 
bia, the  State  capital.  The  negroes  were  far  less  ignorant  than  their  fellows  of 
the  coast  and  the  central  counties,  and  were  disposed  to  be  more  reasonable 
in  their  political  views.  It  is  true  that,  after  the  war  the  Ku-Klux  organiza- 
tion committed  abominable  outrages  throughout  York,  Union,  Spartanburg, 
Laurens  and  Chester  counties.  It  was  shown,  at  the  time  of  the  exposure 
consequent  on  the  military  arrests,  that  2,000  male  citizens  of  a  single  county 
belonged  to  the  Ku-Klux,  and  actively  participated  in  the  coercive  measures 
which  it  had  foolishly  adopted. 

But  the  mountaineers  have  learned  the  folly  of  such  attempts,  and  there 
are  no  longer  any  reports  of  whippings  and  midnight  massacres.  The  rail- 
road and  the  advent  of  Northern  men  here  and  there,  as  well  as  the  impetus 
which  the  universal  use  of  the  new  fertilizers  has  given  to  the  production  of  cot- 
ton upon  lands  where,  before  the  war,  it  would  not  have  been  deemed  wise  to 
plant  it — all    have  aided   in   building   up  new  feeling,  and   in  banishing  most 


$i6 


THE   "BLUE   RIDGE"  RAILROAD. 


of  the  old  bitterness.  Had  it  not  been  for  the  supreme  rascality  of  the  hybrid 
State  Government,  the  citizens  of  this  upland  region  might  have  possessed 
even  more  railroad  facilities  than  they  at  present  enjoy.  The  "Blue  Ridge" 
route  was  intended  as  a  railroad  into  Kentucky  and  Tennessee,  running 
across  the  southern  end  of  the  Blue  Ridge,  in  South  Carolina,  which  latter 
State  and  the  city  of  Charleston  owned  nearly  all  the  stock  in  the  road  up  to  187 1. 
After  about  $3,000,000  had  been  expended  in  the  construction  of  a  oortion 
of  the  road,  and  the  State  had  guaranteed  $4,000,000  of  bonds,  in  support  offur- 


The  Lookers-on  at  the  Greenville  Fair.     [Page  517.] 


ther  construction,  upon  certain  conditions  intended  to  protect  its  own  interests,  a 
gigantic  fraud  was  consummated.  The  "  sinking  fund  commission,"  composed  of 
the  State  officers,  self-appointed,  passed  the  railroad  into  the  hands  of  a  corpora- 
tion, robbing  the  State  of  its  interest  in  the  work,  and  then  secured  a  legislative 
enactment  annulling  the  conditions  on  which  depended  the  issue  of  the  four  mil- 
lions in  bonds. 


GREENVILLE,      S.C. —  ITS      FAIR  —  COTTON-PLANTING.  5  T  7 

In  addition  to  this,  the  Legislature  authorized  a  further  issue  of  "  Blue  Ridge" 
scrip  to  the  amount  of  $1,800,000,  and 'made  it  available  by  declaring  it  re- 
ceivable for  taxes.  This  afforded  "operators"  the  chance  they  desired  for 
plundering  the  State  treasury ;  and  meantime  the  Blue  Ridge  railroad  remains 
unfinished. 

It  was  late  in  the  autumn  when  I  reached  Greenville,  but  the  weather  was 
warm  and  delightful.  The  small  planters  from  all  the  country  round  were  crowd- 
ing the  roads  with  their  mule-carts,  laden  with  one,  two,  or  three  bales  of  cotton. 
The  agents  for  the  sale  of  fertilizers  were  busy  in  the  town  looking  after  their 
interests,  for  many  a  planter  had  given  them  a  lien  upon  his  crop,  and  they 
wished  to  claim  their  money  when  the  crop  was  brought  to  market. 

There  was  a  variety  of  testimony  as  to  the  profit  made  by  the  cotton-raisers 
who  only  planted  two  or  three  acres  each  ;  some  insisted  that  they  made  hand- 
some profits,  others  that,  after  they  had  paid  for  their  fertilizers,  and  their  own 
support  during  the  year,  they  usually  had  nothing  left.  The  "lien"  which  the 
seller  of  phosphate  takes,  when  he  delivers  a  ton  of  the  coveted  stimulating 
substance  to  the  farmer,  is  a  formidable  document.  It  engages  not  only  the 
growing  crop,  but  in  many  cases  the  household  goods,  if  the  crop  fails,  and 
sometimes  the  unlucky  wight  who  has  a  poor  crop  on  his  few  acres  finds  himself 
in  danger  of  a  practical  eviction. 

But  a  good  crop  puts  money  and  prosperity  into  this  section,  where  the  peo- 
ple are  altogether  better  off  than  in  the  lowlands.  They  have  every  facility  for 
enriching  themselves,  as  soon  as  they  can  and  will  diversify  the  culture  of  their 
farms;  and  I  noticed  with  pleasure  the  introduction  of  the  "Agricultural  fair"  as 
a  means  of  creating  ambition  in  the  direction  of  thorough  farm  culture.  Green- 
ville held  its  first  fair  of  the  kind  during  my  stay  there. 

All  along  the  highways  leading  into  Greenville  cotton  whitened  the  fields; 
although  it  was  late  in  November,  there  were  immense  fields  yet  to  pick ;  and 
I  was  told  that  the  whole  crop  is  often  not  all  picked  before  the  advent  of  the 
spring  months.  The  bareheaded  negroes  were  lazily  pulling  at  the  white  fleeces, 
wherever  we  passed,  but  seemed  animated  by  no  desire  for  results ;  it  was  easy 
to  see  why  the  crop  was  not  all  gathered  before  spring.  Emigrants  from  other 
States  would  find  every  chance  for  enriching  themselves  in  these  charming 
uplands,  where  the  climate  is  so  delicious ;  where  the  streams  and  the  hills  are  so 
beautiful,  and  where  the  soil  is  so  fertile. 

Greenville  lies  at  the  base  of  the  Saluda,  near  the  Paris  mountain,  and  is 
delightfully  situated  on  a  range  of  breezy  hills.  Summer  visitors  from  the  low- 
lands crowd  its  hotels  and  private  mansions ;  it  has,  like  its  neighbor,  Spartan- 
burg, a  number  of  excellent  schools  and  colleges,  and  a  university.  It  is  near 
the  source  of  the  Reedy  river,  and  the  approaches  to  it  from  Columbia  are  along 
the  banks  of  that  lovely  stream,  the  Saluda.  To  the  eastward,  daintily  enshrined 
in  a  nook  in  the  Blue  Ridge,  near  the  North  Carolina  frontier,  lies  Walhalla,  a 
German  settlement,  where  the  vine  is  cultivated  with  rare  success ;  the  county 
of  Pickens  is  rich  in  mountain  outlooks  and  noble  waterfalls ;  and  not  more  than 
twenty  miles  from  Greenville,  that  superb  monarch  of  the  glens,  Table  mountain, 


5i8 


MOUNTAIN      SCENERY. 


with  its  ledges,  each  a  thousand  feet  high,  rises  in  rocky  grandeur  to  the  height 
of  4,300  feet  above  sea-level. 

From  the  Greenville  post-office,  the  stage-coach  will  speedily  convey  one  into 
the  heart  of  the  Swannanoa  and  French  Broad  valleys  in  North  Carolina.  The 
road  to  Asheville  leads  through  Saluda  Gap,  and  past  the  beautiful  summer 
resort,  once  the  refuge  of  so  many  wealthy  lowlanders,  "  Flat  Rock."  This  was 
a  species  of  Saratoga  for  the  South  Carolinians,  and  in  the  sweet  valley  there  are 
still  some  noble  mansions,  like  those  of  the  Draytons  and  Memmingers,  sur- 
rounded by  gardens  filled  with  rarest  and  costliest  of  shrubbery  and  flowers. 
Another  route  from  Greenville  leads  to  "  Caesar's  Head,"  a  lofty  mountain  like 
the  "Whiteside,"  and  a  trysting  place  for  hundreds  of  merry  pilgrims  during 
summer  months. 

Along  the  road,  between  Greenville  and  Asheville,  and  the  rugged  yet 
delightful  routes  which  lead  from  Asheville  to  Charlotte,  lies  one  of  the  great 

pleasure  regions  of  the  future.  The 
falls  of  Slicking,  at  the  base  of  the 
Table  mountain,  the  banks  of  that 
prince  among  mountain  streams,  the 
wonderful  Keowee,  the  sweet  vale  of 
Jocasse,  and  the  adjacent  Whitewater 
cataracts,  vie  with  Mount  Yonah, 
Tallulah,  Toccoa,  and  Nacoochee,  their 
Georgian  neighbors,  in  variety  and 
surprising  beauty. 

From  Charlotte  to  Centreville  the 
scenery  is  sublimely  beautiful.  By 
this  route  one  passes  through  the 
Hickory  Nut  Gap,  a  grand  gorge  in 
the  Blue  Ridge,  through  which  a  creek 
flows  until  its  waters  are  merged  in 
those  of  the  rocky  Broad  river.  Where 
.'       '         I  "%       the   latter   stream    forces    its    passage 

through  a  spur  of  the  Blue  Ridge, 
its  bed  is  encumbered  with  myriads 
of  rocks,  rooted  deeply  in  the  almost 
unyielding  soil ;  mountain  bluffs  hem  it  in ;  the  scene  is  one  of  fearful  solitude 
and  grandeur.  The  Gap  is  hardly  anywhere  more  than  half  a  mile  wide,  and, 
seen  from  a  little  distance,  it  seems  but  a  narrow  path  cut  between  gigantic 
buttresses  of  stone,  which  rise  2,500  feet. 

Midway  up  the  front  of  the  highest  bluff,  on  the  south  side  of  the  Gap, 
stands  an  isolated  rock  resembling  some  antique  and  weather-beaten  castle  turret. 
The  rains  of  thousands  of  years  have  washed  the  granite  cliffs  smooth,  and  one 
may  fancy  them  the  walls  of  some  huge  fortification.  Shooting  out  over  the 
cliff,  and  falling  into  some  as  yet  undiscovered  pool,  a  spray-stream  comes 
pouring;  and  near  the  base  of  the  awful  precipice  are  three  violent  and  capricious 


Table  Mountain  —  South  Carolina. 


;,; 


HICKORY     NUT     GAP  —  NORTH-EASTERN     GEORGIA.  519 

cascades,  which,  by  centuries  of  persistence,  have  worn  wells  from  forty  to  fifty 
feet  deep  in  the  hard  stone  beneath  them.  When  one  approaches  the  Gap,  he 
sees  before  him  nothing  but  the  limitless  ocean  of  peaks,  pointed  sharply,  like 
the  apexes  of  waves,  against  the  crystal  vault  of  the  sky.  Everywhere  Nature 
seems  to  have  thrown  out  barriers,  and  to  have  determined  to  prevent  one  from 
entering  her  favorite  retreat. 

Then  suddenly  one  comes  upon  the  narrow  defile  of  the  "  Hickory  Nut 
Gap." 

Beyond  it,  penetrating  to  Rutherfordton,  one  sees  the  sublime  sentinels  of  the 
Blue  Ridge  range  jealously  guarding  the  approaches,  and  at  last  reaches  a  point 
whence  the  panorama  of  the  Pinnacle,  and  Sugar  Loaf,  and  Chimney  Rock,  and 
Tryon  mountains  all  burst  at  once  upon  the  vision.  The  road  thither  winds 
along  a  ravine-side ;  steep  rocks  overhang  it,  and  beneath  it  a  rushing  torrent 
screams  its  warning.  An  opening  in  the  forest  shows  anew  the  vast  expanse 
of  peaks,  and  in  their  midst  the  Monarch,  the  Cloud-piercer,  the  sombre  con- 
troller of  the  whole  magic  realm,  Mitchell's  high  peak  ! 

Miles  away,  to  the  westward,  one  can  dimly  discern  a  silver  line  on  a  faintly 
defined  mountain :  it  is  a  torrent  leaping  down  the  almost  perpendicular  sides  of 
its  parent  height. 

Southward  from  Greenville  toward  Atlanta,  the  Air  Line  road  runs  through 
the  forests  of  Northern  Georgia.  I  found  many  small  towns,  built  of  rough 
planks,  growing  briskly  in  the  forest  clearings.  The  railway  station  and  a 
long  platform,  a  store,  a  few  plain  houses,  with  fat  hogs  rooting  among  the 
stumps  in  their  immediate  neighborhood,  a  carpenter's  shop,  and,  possibly, 
some  small  and  primitive  manufactory,  made  up  each  of  these  "towns."  The 
hotels  were  two-story  wooden  buildings,  through  whose  thin  walls  came  the 
keen  autumn  winds,  and  whose  slender  partitions  allowed  one  to  hear  every 
movement  and  tone  of  voice  of  all  his  adjacent  fellow-sleepers. 

The  fifteen  counties  of  North-eastern  Georgia  cover  a  territory  of  7,000  square 
miles,  traversed  here  and  there  by  the  Appalachian  chain,  which,  leaving  North 
Carolina  on  its  western  boundary,  pushes  into  hundreds  of  spurs  and  outliers 
which  shape  the  romantic  scenery  of  Rabun,  Habersham,  Towne,  Union,  White, 
Fannin,  Gilmer,  and  Lumpkin  counties.  There,  in  valleys  elevated  nearly  2,000 
feet  above  the  sea-level,  are  rivers  and  rivulets  upon  whose  courses  some  of  the 
most  majestic  cascades  on  the  continent  are  found.  Attracted  by  the  fame  of 
those  noble  waterfalls,  Toccoa  and  Tallulah,  I  left  the  line  of  rail,  and  with  a 
friendly  company,  wandered  in  and  out  among  the  peaks  and  ravines  for  several 
days. 

Rabun  Gap  is  the  passage  from  Western  North  Carolina,  through  the  Blue 
Ridge,  into  the  Georgia  gold  and  iron  field.  Rabun  county  itself  is  one  succes- 
sion of  dark  blue  giant  ridges,  over  which,  descending  gradually,  one  reaches  the 
little  town  of  Clayton.  The  populations  in  the  mountains  along  the  border 
devote  some  attention  to  illicit  distilling,  and  are,  consequently,  a  little  suspicious 
of  strangers  who  penetrate  to  their  fastnesses.  A  worthy  clergyman  from  the 
lower  counties  was  journeying  peacefully  on  a  religious  errand  to  the  neighboring 


520 


RABUN      GAP CLAYTON. 


State,  through  the  passes  of  Rabun,  shortly  before  our  visit,  when  he  suddenly, 
one  day,  saw  thirteen  guns  pointed  at  him  by  as  many  men,  and  had  to  dis- 
mount and  prove,  at  the  rifles'  muzzles,  that  he  was  not  a  revenue  officer. 

From  "Whiteside,"  in  North  Carolina,  to  Rabun  Gap,  it  is  only  forty-five  or 
fifty  miles  on  an  air  line,  but  the  detours  through  the  ravines  make  it  farther 
to  the  traveler.  When  one  arrives  at  Clayton  he  feels  much  as  if  he  had  left  the 
world  behind  him.  The  quaint  hamlet  lies  in  a  valley  encircled  with  mountains. 
As  you  enter,  you  have  that  feeling  of  being  imprisoned  and  of  desire  to  escape, 

so  common  to  the  wanderer 
among  the  Alleghanies  and  on 
the  Blue  Ridge.  There  seems  no 
possible  outlet;  the  town  appears 
to  have  been  conveyed  there  by 
enchantment;  yet  a  little  careful 
observation    will    show   you    the 


"Let  us  address  de  Almighty  wid  pra'r."     [Page  521.] 

roads  piercing  the-  passes  in  the  valleys.  Not  far  from  Clayton  are  the  falls  of 
the  Estatoia,  or,  as  the  mountaineers  call  them,  "Rabun  Falls,"  where  a  succes- 
sion of  brilliant  cascades  plunge  down  the  chasm  in  a  mountain-side.  Clam- 
bering to  the  top  of  this  natural  stairway  in  the  rocks,  one  may  obtain  an 
outlook  over  the  valley  of  the  Tennessee,  miles  beyond  Clayton,  and  may  note 
the  mountain  billows  rolling  away,  apparently  innumerable,  until  the  eye  tires 
of  the  immensity! 

I  have  had  occasion  to  describe  the  mountain  "hack"  to  you — a  red  wagon 
mounted  on  super-fragile  springs,  and  graced  with  seats,  which,  at  every  start 
made  by  the  horses,  bid  fair  to  leave  the  vehicle.  In  such  a  conveyance,  behind 
two  splendid  horses,  did  we  depart  from  one  of  the  forest  towns  on  the  Air  Line 


A      NEGRO      MEETING. 


521 


railway  one  morning  in  mid-October,  and  climb  the  red  hills  of  Northern 
Georgia.  Mile  after  mile  we  journeyed  through  lands  which  might  be  made 
very  valuable  by  a  year  or  two  of  careful  culture,  by  plantations  or  farms  whose 
owners  had  deserted  them,  or  tracts  which  the  old  settlers,  having  adopted  the 


Mount  Yonah,  as  seen  from  Clarksville,   Georgia.      [Page  522.] 

new  labor  system,  were  putting  into  most  wonderful  order ;  now  dashed  over  firm 
roads,  through  stretches  of  dreary  forest,  where  battalions  of  black-jacks  guarded 
the  solemn  way;  and  now  along  mountain-sides,  where  paths  were  narrow  and 
ravines  were  on  either  hand. 

A  few  miles  from* the  little  hill-town  of  Clarksville,  whither  we  were  journey- 
ing, we  came  upon  a  large  assembly  of  negroes  in  a  high,  open  field,  backed  by 
a  noble  uplift  of  mountains  in  the  distance.  It  was  Sunday  afternoon,  and  the 
dusky  citizens  were  returning  to  their  devotions,  the  scene  of  which  was  a  log- 
cabin,  inhabited  by  a  negro,  whom  we  judged  to  be  the  neighborhood  blacksmith, 
as  a  shop  near  by  was  encumbered  with  wheels  and  old  iron. 

As  we  approached  the  "  bars  "  leading  into  the  meadow,  the  mass  of  the 
negroes  had  gathered  inside  and  outside  the  cabin,  and  were  singing  a  wild 
hymn,  marked  with  that  peculiar  monotonous  refrain  which  distinguishes  all 
their  music.  Nothing  could  have  been  more  picturesque  than  this  grouping  of 
swart  and  gayly- costumed  peasantry,  disposed  around  the  humble  cabin,  with 
the  afternoon  sun  glistening  on  their  upturned  faces.  The  noble  peaks  in  the 
far  background,  mysterious  in  their  garments  of  subtle  blue,  and  inspiring 
in  their  majesty,  added  deliciously  to  the  effect  of  the  whole. 

As  the  singers  became  excited,  their  bodies  moved  rhythmically,  and  cling- 
ing to  each  other's  hands,  they  seemed  about  breaking  into  the  passionate 
warmth  of  some  barbaric  ceremony.  But  our  momentary  fears  of  barbarism 
were  checked  when  we  heard  the  cracked  voice  of  the  venerable  pastor,  and 
saw  the  assembly  kneel,  and  bow  their  heads  at  the  words — 
"Let  us  address  de  Almighty  wid  pra'r." 

While  the  minister  was  praying,  the  young  negroes  who,  during  the  sing- 
ing, had  been  disporting  near  a  neighboring  brook,  left  off  their  pranks,  and 
hastened  to  join  the  kneeling  throng  about  the  cabin.     As  we  drove  away  we* 


522 


CLARKSVILLE NACOOCHEE     VALLEY. 


could  hear  the  solemn  pleading  of  the  ebony  Jacob  as  he  wrestled  with  the 
angel  of  prayer,  and  the  nervous  responses  of  the  brethren  and  sisters  when 
their  souls  took  fire  from  the  inspiration  of  the  moment. 

From  Clarksville,  pleasant  sum- 
mer resort  of  the  citizens  of  Sav- 
annah and  other  land  towns,  we 
caught  a  new  glimpse  of  Mount 
Yonah,  that  lonely  monarch  of  the 
northern  counties.  The  village  is 
small  and  quiet ;  there  are  few 
farm-houses  in  the  immediate  vicin- 
ity ;  there  is  no  bustle  of  trade, 
no  railroad,  and  no  prospect  of 
one.  Seven  miles  away  the  new 
Air  Line  gives  communication  with 
the  outer  world.  Habersham 
county,  of  which  Clarksville  is  the 
county  seat,  was  laid  out  by  the 
famous  "lottery  act"  of  1818,  and 
has  in  it  many  valuable  lands  adapt- 
ed to  the  raising  of  wheat  and  corn. 
A  ride  from  Clarksville  to  the 
valley  of  Nacoochee,  which  com- 
prises within  its  limits  a  series  of 
the  most  exquisite  landscapes  in 
the  world,  is  one  of  the  charming 
specimens  of  this  mountain  journey. 
There  a  gentleman  who  has  for- 
saken the  lowlands  has  built  a 
grand  mansion  with  conservatories, 
lawns,  and  parterres;  there  he  and 
his  visitors  strike  terror  into  the 
hearts  of  the  mountain  trout,  and 
wander  over  the  peaks  and  down 
the  valleys  at  their  will.  Mount 
Yonah's  summit  affords  beautiful 
glimpses  of  a  wide  expanse,  cov- 
ered with  rich  farms — for  the 
Nacoochee  valley  is  fertile,  and  its 
vicinity  is  thickly  settled. 

The  other  visitors  at  Clarksville 
considered  us  aristocracts  because 


The  "Grand  Chasm,"  Tugaloo  River,  Northern  Georgia. 
•      [Page  524.] 


we  maintained  the  dignity  of  a  red  wagon  on  our  journey  to  Tallulah  Falls. 
They  had  usually  accomplished  the  route  in  the  somewhat  fatiguing  but  cautious 
ox-cart.     The  famous  falls,  unquestionably  among  the  grandest  objects  of  natural 


TALLULAH      FALLS      IN     NORTHERN     GEORGIA.  523 

scenery  in  America,  are  thirteen  miles  from  Clarksville,  and  a  portion  of  the 
journey  lies  over  a  new  road  through  the  forest,  which  I  may  safely  condemn 
as  execrable. 

On  the  border  of  a  vast  rent  in  the  hills  stands  a  little  hotel  built  of  pine 
boards.  From  its  verandas  you  look  up  at  ravine-sides  of  solid  brown  stone ; 
down  into  leaping  and  foaming  rapids,  which  seem  singing  war  songs;  over  the 
tops  of  swaying  pines,  which,  in  the  rich  moonlight  of  a  delicious  autumn  even- 
ing, stand  out,  black  and  frightful,  like  spectres;  and  along  paths  cut  in  the  steep 
descents,  leading  to  rocky  projections  and  treacherous  knolls. 

These  falls  were  named  by  the  Cherokees,  who  called  them  Tarrurah  or  Tal- 
lulah — "the  terrible."  The  stream  in  which  they  are  formed  is  the  western 
branch  of  the  Tugaloo  river,  and  the  rapids  are,  perhaps,  ten  miles  from  its 
junction  with  the  Chattooga.  For  more  than  a  mile  the  impetuous  stream  passes 
through  a  ridge  of  mountains,  with  awful  parapets  of  stone  piled  upon  either 
side,  and  finally  rattles  away  through  the  "  Grand  Chasm." 

The  rocky  banks  are  in  some  places  five  hundred,  in  others  not  more  than 
two  hundred  feet  high;  their  bases  are  worn  into  fantastic  and  grotesque  forms  by 
the  action  of  the  dashing  waters;  and  the  stream,  at  no  point  very  wide,  breaks 
into  four  cataracts,  which  vary  from  fifty  to  eighty  feet  in  height,  and  into  many 
others  from  twenty  to  thirty.  From  the  highest  points  on  the  cliffs  to  the  bot- 
tom of  the  river-bed,  at  one  or  two  localities,  the  depth  is  nearly  1,000  feet;  and 
the  spectator,  dizzy  and  awe-struck,  can  but  do  as  we  did — look  once,  and  turn 
his  frightened  and  bewildered  eyes  away ! 

The  "Lodore,"  the  "Tempestia,"  the  "Oceana,"  and  the  "Serpentine,"  are 
the  names  given  to  the  four  principal  falls.  The  third  fall,  sometimes  called  the 
"  Hurricane,"  is  the  most  remarkable  and  interesting.  Climbing  to  a  rock 
directly  overhanging  it,  and  beneath  which  the  waters  are  breaking  across  irreg- 
ular shelving  masses  of  stone,  and  foaming  and  dancing  in  passion  in  a  whirlpool 
eighty  feet  below,  one  may  gaze  down  stream  to  the  sortie  from  the  canon. 

There  the  whole  valley  seems  to  pitch  violently  forward,  as  if  it  were  the 
entrance  to  Avernus ;  its  rocky  sides  are  mottled  with  lichens  and  the  beautiful 
colt's-foot;  and  on  the  crests  of  the  cliffs  flourish  pines,  hemlocks,  masses  of 
ferns,  and  a  profusion  of  grays  and  browns  which  no  painter's  brush  can  repro- 
duce. Many  trees  lean  as  if  looking  shudderingly,  and  drawn  involuntarily, 
toward  the  abyss.  Beyond  is  a  sheer  precipice  draped  in  hemlocks  only,  and 
still  beyond,  a  projection  which,  when  I  saw  it,  was  ablaze  with  the  strong  autumn 
colors  of  the  leaves,  red,  and  scarlet,  and  yellow,  above  which  runs  up  a  hundred 
and  fifty  feet  of  naked,  glittering  rock,  towering  tremendously  above  the  tallest 
trees,  and  standing  in  giant  relief  against  the  sky. 

Coming  back  to  the  banks  near  the  "  Hurricane  "  fall,  we  noticed  that  the 
ledges  bent  downward  in  three  or  four  immense  layers  of  dark  flint,  and  that 
grasses  grew  over  them,  like  strange  beards  upon  monsters'  faces.  Here  and 
there  an  old  white  tree-trunk  hung  tottering  on  the  ravine's  edges.  The  descent 
to  this  fall  is  down  a  gully  almost  perpendicular  in  steepness ;  one  is  also  com- 
pelled  to  pass  through  the  "  Needle's  Eye,"  a  low  passage  beneath  rocks,  and 


524 


THE   CASCADES THE   "GRAND   CHASM, 


height  known  as 


the  "Post-office,"  where  it  was  once  the  custom  for  the  hundreds  of  visitors  to 
write  their  names  upon  the  smooth  walls  of  a  cave. 

The  cascades  themselves  are  not  so  remarkable  as  the  scenery  around  them. 
The  rocks  and  the  precipices  are  so  gigantic  that  the  stream  seems  but  a  silvery 

thread    among     them. 

Seen    from    the 


dizzy 
The 
Devil's  Pulpit,"  or  "The 
Lover's  Leap,"  the  cas- 
cades are  like  tiny  lace 
veils,  spread  in  the  val- 
ley, or  like  frostbeds, 
such  as  one  sees  on 
meadows  in  the  morn- 
ing. 

The  effect  of  a  so- 
journ among  the  rocks 
at  Lover's  Leap  at 
night,  when  the  moon- 
light is  brilliant,  is  mag- 
ical. Far  below  you  the 
valley  seems  sheathed 
in  molten  silver;  the 
song  of  the  cascades  is 
borne,  now  fiercely, 
now  gently,  to  your 
ears  by  the  varying 
breezes;  while  you 
grovel  among  the  slip- 
pery pine  and  hemlock 
sprays  and  twigs,  cling- 
ing to  a  rock,  which 
is  your  only  protec- 
tion against  a  fall  of  a 
thousand  feet  down  to 
the  jagged  peaks  below. 
At  the  "Grand 
Chasm,"  which  is  prop- 
erly the  end  of  the 
ravine,  where  the 
stream,  free  from  its 
barriers,  becomes  tran- 
quil,— after  it  has 
fought  its  way  around  the  base  of  a  mountain  of  dark  granite, — the  formation 
of  rock  changes.     There  are  no  more  of  the  slanting  shelves,  of  the  Avernus 


Toccoa  I1 


TOCCOA MINERAL     WEALTH.  525 

gates  ;  but  instead,  there  are  rounded  battlements,  which,  sloping  and  yielding, 
end  in  a  ragged  hill-side,  strewn  with  bowlders,  with  blackened  hemlocks,  and 
with  tree-trunks  prone,  as  if  waiting  for  some  landslide  to  hurl  them  into  the 
stream. 

On  the  right  looms  up  another  cliff,  with  a  slope  like  that  of  walls  rising  from 
a  castle- moat;  this  is  thatched  with  foliage  ;  hemlocks  straggle  along  its  summit; 
and  in  the  recesses  of  the  thickets  which  stretch  in  all  directions  from  it,  the 
holly  spreads  its  thorny  leaves,  and  the  laurel  its  pendants. 

Finally  the  stream  is  lost  to  view  and  flows  under  rocks,  through  a  sym- 
metrical gap  half  a  mile  away, — beyond  which  one  can  see  a  succession  of 
peaks,  whose  heads  are  wrapped  in  cloud. 

After  "Tallulah,"  the  falls  of  Toccoa,  a  single  spray  jet,  falling  one 
hundred  and  eighty-five  feet,  over  a  shelving  rock,  is  a  relief.  Seated  in  a 
quiet  and  forest- enshrouded  valley,  through  which  Toccoa  creek  runs,  one 
can  look  up  to  the  pouring  waters  with  a  sense  of  admiration,  but  without 
the  awe  inspired  by  the  chasms  and  cascades  of  "The  Terrible."  Toccoa  is 
situated  near  Toccoa  City,  an  ambitious  fledgling  town  on  the  Air  Line 
railroad,  and  thousands  of  visitors  yearly  watch  its  tremendous  leap  from  the 
crag,  around  which  a  steep  road  winds  along  the  ascents  that  conduct  to 
"Tallulah." 

The  copper  region  of  Northern  Georgia  is  a  continuation  of  the  remarkable 
one  in  Eastern  Tennessee.  A  vein  of  copper  seventeen  feet  thick  has  been  found 
in  one  of  the  counties.  In  Fannin  county  there  are  large  bodies  of  marble,  and 
there  is  an  iron-field  on  the  southern  slopes  of  the  Iron  mountain  range.  A 
great  deal  has  been  said  about  the  gold  mines  in  the  northern  counties.  There 
are,  no  doubt,  extensive  deposits  there.  The  mines  in  the  Nacoochee  valley, 
when  first  worked,  on  a  very  small  scale,  and  with  rude  machinery,  yielded  from 
$2,000  to  $3,000  to  each  workman  yearly ;  and  several  millions  of  dollars  have 
been  obtained  from  the  deposits  since  1828.  The  Loud,  Sprague,  and  Lewis 
mines,  in  the  vicinity  of  Nacoochee,  are  believed  to  be  exceptionally  rich.  In 
Rabun,  Habersham,  Carroll,  and  White  counties  there  are  known  to  be  extensive 
deposits.  In  the  Nacoochee  valley  immense  works  for  carrying  out  the  Califor- 
nia hydraulic  process  were  erected  before  the  war ;  but  have  since  that  time  been 
only  feebly  worked. 

In  the  section  between  the  Tray  and  Yonah  mountains  some  few  diamonds 
have  from  time  to  time  been  found.  Not  far  from  this  point  are  the  head-waters 
of  the  Tennessee,  which,  passirfg  through  Rabun  Gap,  plunge  downward  through 
the  Appalachian,  the  Smoky,  the  Chilhowee,  and  Cumberland  ranges,  until, 
merged  in  a  broad  and  noble  stream,  they  enter  the  fertile  fields  of  Tennessee 
and  Alabama.  There,  too,  the  Savannah  rises;  there  the  waters  of  the  rain- 
storm divide,  and  flow  in  separate  directions  in  the  channels  of  the  two  mighty 
rivers.  It  is  said  that  several  good  gold  mines  in  Hall  county  have  been  opened, 
and  worked  as  low  as  the  water-level,  and  that  they  pay  a  small  but  steady 
profit.  In  Hall  county  is  also  situated  the  "  Harris  Lode,"  a  notable  silver  mine; 
and  in  the  neighboring  divisions  of  Lumpkin,  Forsyth  and  Clarke,  topaz, 
34 


526 


AN     AGRICULTURAL      EXAMPLE      NEEDED. 


amethysts,  beryl,  gold,  plumbago,  iron,  granite,  and  gneiss  have  been  found.* 
In  Clarke  county,  where  the  Georgia  University  is  located,  there  is  remarkable 
water  power,  and  some  cotton  and  woolen  factories  have  been  erected. 

This  mountain  region,  so  rich  in  resource,  has  Been  as  yet  but  little  developed. 
With  the  completion  of  the  railroad  system,  which  is  very  comprehensive,  and 
puts  almost  every  county  within  easy  reach  of  markets,  the  more  enterprising  of 
the  present  residents  think  that  new  population  and  new  methods  of  agriculture 
will  come  in. 

The  valley  lands  now  readily  yield  twenty  to  thirty  bushels  of  corn  and  fifteen 
of  wheat  to  the  acre,  without  manures,  and  with  no  culture  of  consequence ;  deep 
ploughing  and  rotation  of  crops  would  treble  these  amounts.  The  local  farmers 
need  the  example  of  Northern  agriculture  before  their  eyes.  With  lands  which 
will  produce  infinitely  finer  and  larger  crops  of  clover  and  timothy  than 
those  of  Massachusetts,  they  still  send  to  the  Bay  State  for  their  hay.  But  living 
is  cheaper  than  in  the  Western  States,  game  is  plentiful,  and  good  land, 
"improved"  in  the  Georgia  sense,  is  to  be  had  at  reasonable  prices. 

*At  Dahlonega,  in  Lumpkin  county,  a  pretty  town  commanding  fine  mountain  views,  the 
United  States  has  a  branch  mint,  and  gold  mines  are  quite  extensively  worked  in  the  vicinity. 


A  Mail-Carrier. 


LIX. 


CHATTANOOGA,  THE  GATEWAY  OF  THE  SOUTH. 


A 


T  a  little  distance  from  the  locality  known  as  Bird's  Mill,  not  far  from 
the  boundary  line  between  Tennessee  and  Georgia,  and  within  the  limits 
of  the  former  State,  there  stands,  among  tangled  underbrush,  a  massive  yet 
simple  monument.  Around  it  the  envious  brier  has  crept,  and  the  humbler 
headstones  which  here  and    there  dot  the  thicket  are  also  hedged  about  with 


Mission  Ridge,  near  Chattanooga,  Tennessee.     [Page  528.] 

weeds  and  creepers.  Neglect  and  oblivion  seem,  to  the  hasty  observer,  to  have 
so  effectually  covered  the  spot  with  their  wings,  that  even  the  dwellers  in  the 
neighborhood  hardly  know  whom  or  what  the  marble  and  the  stone  represent. 
Yet  these  obscure  memorials  call  to  mind  some  of  the  most  touching  and 
remarkable  episodes  in  our  history  as  a  nation.  They  point  backward,  through 
the  miraculous  years  of  the  last  half  century,  to  the  time  when  the  Cherokees  held 
all  the  country  about  them  ;  to  the  time  of  the  mission-schools,  and  the  heroic 
efforts  of  the  "American  Board  "  to  establish  them.  A  weather-beaten  inscription 
on  the  marble  monument  discloses  the  fact  that  beneath  it  is  the  resting-place  of 
the  good  Dr.  Worcester,  first  Secretary  of  the  Board,  and  an  enthusiastic  laborer 
among  the  Cherokees.  A  hundred  rods  away  stands  one  of  the  old  mission- 
houses,  now  a  decaying  ruin,  inhabited  by  a  horde  of  negroes.  Cherokee  and 
missionary  have  gone  their  ways  together ;  there  is  not  one  to  be  encountered  in 


528  MISSIONS      AMONG      THE      INDIANS. 

any  nook  of  the  forest ;  the  current  of  Fate  has  swept  the  Indian  to  the  West, 
and  the  priests  who  labored  for  him  into  almost  forgotten  graves. 

At  the  beginning  of  the  present  century  the  Indian  still  held  the  territory  of 
North-western  Georgia  secure  against  the  intrusion  of  the  white  man's  laws,  and 
also  roamed  over  extensive  tracts  in  Alabama,  Tennessee  and  North  Carolina. 
In  the  deep  coves  between  the  parallel  ranges  of  the  Cumberland,  along  the  vast 
palisades  by  the  winding  Tennessee,  and  through  the  furrowed  and  ridgy  lands 
extending  toward  Virginia  and  Kentucky,  he  wandered  unrestrained.  But  the 
pale-lace  was  on  his  track,  anxious  first  to  gain  his  good-will,  and  then  to  reason 
him  into  a  cession  of  his  beautiful  lands.  It  was  with  the  bitterness  of  despair  in 
his  heart  that  one  of  the  chieftains  said  he  had  "  learned  to  fear  the  white  man's 
friendship  more  than  his  anger." 

But  the  Cherokees  did  not  seem  to  dread  or  detest  the  missionaries  of  the 
American  Board.  They  knew  them  for  men  without  guile  or  desire  for  personal 
gain,  and  they  learned  to  love  them.  '  When  good  Cyrus  Kingsbury  founded  the 
mission  of  Brainard,  in  1 8 1 7,  on  the  banks  of  that  Chickamauga  whose  waters,  a 
few  years  since,  ran  red  with  the  blood  of  civil  war,  it  was  with  the  cordial 
consent  of  all  the  principal  chiefs.  Schools  and  churches  were  founded ;  log  mis- 
sion-houses erected ;  even  the  President  of  the  United  States  allowed  the  use  of 
the  public  funds  for  the  building  of  a  school-house  for  girls.  Kingsbury,  Corne- 
lius, Evarts  and  Worcester  became  eloquent  champions  of  the  Indians  when  their 
rights  were  assailed,  and  each  missionary  successively  risked  his  liberty  and  life 
for  the  much  wronged  aborigines.  At  last  a  crisis  arrived.  The  State  of 
Georgia  began  to  extend  her  criminal  jurisdiction  over  the  lands  claimed  by  the 
Cherokees,  and  with  scorn  disregarded  all  efforts  of  the  Indians  to  protect  them- 
selves by  an  appeal  to  the  Supreme  Court  •  of  the  United  States.  Angered 
because  the  missionaries  sided  with  the  Cherokees  in  the  exciting  question,  the 
officers  of  the  Georgia  Government  imprisoned  the  noble  Worcester  and  one  of 
his  fellow-laborers  in  the  penitentiary,  for  "  illegal  residence  among  the  Indians," 
and  "because  they  gave  advice  on  political  matters."  This  last  charge  the  mis- 
sionaries solemnly  denied,  but  refused  of  their  own  will  to  quit  their  posts,  and 
the  pardon  which  had  been  offered  them  was  withdrawn.  While  they  spent 
weary  months  in  prison,  the  Cherokees  were  occupied  with  internal  dissension, 
and  with  ineffectual  resistance  to  the  encroaching  Georgians.  At  last  the  treaties 
which  virtually  banished  the  Indians  from  their  homes  were  signed,  and  in  1838 
the  troops  gathered  up  into  one  long  and  sorrowful  procession  thousands  of  men, 
women  and  children,  and  hurried  them  from  the  State.  Depleted  and  worn 
down  by  every  imaginable  privation,  more  than  4,000  of  the  unfortunates  died 
on  their  long  march  of  600  miles  to  their  new  homes  west  of  the  Mississippi, — 
forming  a  ghastly  sacrifice  to  commemorate  the  white  man's  greed. 

Leaving  the  brier-invaded  grave-yard  and  the  tumbling  mission-houses,  and 
climbing  to  the  summit  of  Mission  Ridge,  a  vision  of  perfect  beauty  is  before  one. 
To  the  east  is  Chickamauga  valley,  following  the  course  of  the  historic  creek,  and 
dotted  with  pleasant  farms  and  noble  groves;  westward  one  looks  down  upon  a 
rich  and  broad  interval,  bounded  by  high  bluffs  with  rocky  faces,   along  whose 


CHATTANOOGA      VALLEY. 


529 


bases  the  noble  stream  of  the  Tennessee  flows  with  many  an  eccentric  turn,  until, 
as  if  amazed  and  startled  at  the  grandeur  of  Lookout  mountain,  which  rises  just 
within  the  vale f  to  2,400  feet  above  the  sea-level,  it  turns  inland  once  more  in  a 
western  course,  becoming  rapid  and  turbulent  as  it  descends  through  gorges  and 
forests,  to  Northern  Alabama.  "  Lookout"  is  an  outlier  of  the  Cumberland 
table-land,  and  extends  across  the  Tennessee  line  into  Georgia.  One  may  travel 
for  more  than  forty  miles  along  its  breezy  height  without  finding  anywhere  a 
really  advantageous  point  at  which  to  descend.  Between  Mission  Ridge  and 
Lookout  mountain  lies  Chattanooga  valley,  the  "  Crow's  Nest,"  as  the  Indians 
called  it,  and  as  its  name  signifies.  It  is,  indeed,  not  unlike  a  nest  or  cup  securely 
set  down  among  huge  mountain  barriers,  through  which  one  can  discern  no  pass, 


Lookout  Mountain,  near  Chattanooga,  Tennessee. 

and  which  only  the  birds  can  afford  to  despise.  Everywhere  ridges,  sharply- 
projecting  spurs  from  the  Cumberland,  caves,  forests,  rocks,  bluffs !  How  can 
traffic  find  its  way  through  such  a  country  ? 

Far  below,  as  you  stand  on  Mission  Ridge,  with  "  Lookout's"  shadow  thrown 
across  the  brilliant  sunlight,  falling  on  the  slopes  up  which  Grant  sent  his  men  on 
that  day  of  blood  in  1863,  you  may  see  the  city  of  Chattanooga,  "the  gateway 
of  the  South."  On  the  present  site  of  the  town,  the  south  bank  of  the  Tennessee 
river,  there  stood,  in  1835,  a  Cherokee  trading  post.  In  1837  a  good  many 
white  families  from  Virginia  and  the  Carolinas  had  moved  there,  and  a  post-office 
called  Ross's  Landing  was  established.  The  original  lots  into  which  the  town 
was  partitioned  were  disposed  of  by  lottery,  after  the  expulsion  of  the  Indians, 


530  THE   GROWTH   OF   CHATTANOOGA. 

and  the  vast  commerce  that  to-day  uses  the  Tennessee's  current  as  the  chief 
transporting  medium  soon  created  quite  a  trading  post.  From  upper  Eastern 
Tennessee  came  iron  and  ironware,  corn,  wheat  and  whiskey,  and  Virginia  sent 
down  great  quantities  of  salt.  In  1838  a  new  town  was  started  and  christened 
Chattanooga.*  Ten  years  later,  railroad  communication,  via  Atlanta,  with  Char- 
leston and  Savannah,  gave  the  little  town  40,000  bales  of  cotton  as  its  annual 
shipment ;  and  when  Robert  Cravens  began  to  manufacture  charcoal  iron  there, 
at  a  cost  of  $10  to  $14  per  ton,  shipping  it  to  New  Orleans,  St.  Louis  and  Cin- 
cinnati, for  from  $30  to  $40  per  ton,  the  settlers  multiplied  very  rapidly.  The 
cotton  trade  was  lost  to  Chattanooga  by  the  building  of  the  Memphis  and 
Charleston  railroad,  which  did  away  with  the  painful  navigation  of  the  Tennes- 
see up  from  Alabama,  and  the  portage  around  "  Muscle  Shoals ;"  but  the  grain 
and  stock  trade  steadily  increased,  and  in  1861  the  town  boasted  3,500  popula- 
tion.    Then  the  war  came  to  it. 

Planted  at  the  very  mouth  of  the  narrow  passes,  through  which  trade  and 
travel  pick  their  difficult  way,  Chattanooga  has  sprung,  since  the  war's  close, 
from  a  village  into  a  prosperous  city  of  12,000  inhabitants.  Its  aspect  to-day  is 
that  of  a  North-western  settlement,  Northern  and  Western  men  having  flocked 
to  it  in  large  numbers.  The  men  who  campaigned  among  the  mountains  around 
it,  and  who  fought  so  desperately  to  get  to  it,  year  after  year,  noted  its  wonder- 
ful advantages  as  a  railway  centre  in  one  of  the  richest  mineral  regions  in  the 
world,  and  when  they  were  mustered  out  settled  there.  The  march  of  progress 
began.  It  was  a  revelation  to  the  people  of  the  surrounding  country — that 
steady  and  rapid  improvement  at  Chattanooga.  They  had  always  known  that 
there  were  coal,  iron  and  oil  in  the  vicinity  in  such  quantities  that,  in  the  words 
of  a  public  speaker  who  once  upbraided  them  for  their  lack  of  enterprise,  "within 
sight  of  the  city  might  be  found  Pittsburg  ploughs  that  had  been  worn  out  upon 
the  iron  ore  lying  loosely  on  the  hill-sides;  "  yet  they  had  not  dreamed  that  with 
cheap  iron  and  cheap  coal  at  their  doors  they  had  the  elements  of  empire  in  their 
hands.  To-day  Chattanooga  is  connected  with  the  outer  world  by  five  trunk 
lines  of  rail,  and  the  surveys  for  the  sixth,  and  in  some  respects  the  most  remark- 
able, have  been  completed.  The  Western  and  Atlantic  connects  the  city  with 
Atlanta  and  the  South ;  the  Nashville  and  Chattanooga  line  pierces  the  Cumber- 
land, and  gives  a  route  to  Louisville  and  the  Ohio;  the  East  Tennessee,  Virginia, 
and  Georgia  road  reaches  to  Bristol,  giving  direct  connection  with  Lynchburg, 
Washington  and  New  York ;  the  Alabama  and  Chattanooga  runs  through  mar- 
velous coal  and  iron  fields  to  Meridian,  in  Mississippi,  whence  there  is  a  direct 
line  to  the  "  Father  of  Waters,"  and  the  Memphis  and  Charleston  opens  up  a 
vast  fertile  section  in  Northern  Alabama  and  a  corner  of  Mississippi,  a  section 
unhappily  strewn  at  present  with  wrecks  of  once  prosperous  plantations.  The 
track  of  the  war  is  visible  through  all  the  beautiful  Tennessee  valley,  and  for 
miles  one  sees  nothing  but  ruins  and  neglected  lands.  The  "  Cincinnati  South- 
ern "  railroad  is  intended  to  run  from  the  Ohio  metropolis  to  Chattanooga,  and 

*  This  was  done  at  the  suggestion  of  Mr.  John  P.  Long,  one  of  the  prominent  citizens  of 
Chattanooga,  who  is  very  familiar  with  the  Indian  language  and  legends. 


THE      TENNESSEE      RIVER     TRAFFIC. 


531 


will  operate  as  an  outlet  from  the  Ohio  valley  to  the  south-eastern  seaboard, 
while  it  will  also  furnish  a  desirable  connection  with  the  Gulf  system  of  roads. 
'It  will  penetrate  some  of  the  richest  regions  of  Kentucky,  will  cross  the  Cumber- 
land river  at  Point  Burnside,  and  run  through  the  Sequatchie  valley,  along  an 
almost  unbroken  coal-field. 

With  so  many  important  and  really  finely  -  built  lines  of  travel  stretching  from 
it  in  all  directions,  one  would  naturally  suspect  Chattanooga  of  an  inclination  to 


The  Mineral  Region  in  the  vicinity  of  Chattanooga. 

disregard  her  river  traffic,  yet  she  is  by  no  means  unmindful  of  it.  Operating  as 
the  distributing  point  for  the  whole  river- valley,  and  indeed  for  the  far  South,  the 
city  crowds  her  storehouses  yearly  with  corn,  wheat,  and  bacon,  brought  hun- 
dreds of  miles  in  flat-boats  and  small  steamers  along  the  winding  river  from 
Kentucky,  Virginia  and  North  Carolina.  At  high  water  season  the  stream  is 
crowded  with  rustic  crafts  of  all  kinds,  and  the  jolly  raftsmen  who  have  been 
for  months  in  the  forests,  and  have  drifted  down  stream  on  broad  platforms 
of  pine,  logs,  make   merry  in  highways   and  by-ways.      Transportation  of  coal 


Russell  &  Struthers.N.Ti 


MAP    SHOWING    GRADES    OF    ILLITERACY    IN    THE    UNITED    STATES. 


o 


532  THE      EAST      TENNESSEE      MINERAL      REGION. 

and    iron    by  river   would   not  cost   more  than  one-fourth  the  sum   demanded 
by   the    railways. 

The  surroundings  of  Chattanooga  are  of  the  wildest  and  most  romantic 
beauty,  and  in  gazing  down  from  "  Lookout,"  or  from  'the  humbler  Mission 
Ridge,  upon  the  lovely  valley,  with  its  majestic  river  and  lordly  ledges,  one  can- 
not repress  a  fear  that  some  day  all  these  natural  beauties  will  be  hidden  by  the 
smoke  from  the  five  hundred  chimneys  which  will  be  erected  in  honor  of  the  god 
Iron.  For  it  is  to  be  a  town  of  rolling-mills  and  furnaces,  giant  in  its  traffic,  like 
Pittsburg  and  St.  Louis,  and  inhabited  by  thousands  of  hard-handed,  brawny- 
armed  artisans.  There  is  hardly  a  county  in  Eastern  Tennessee  where  the 
resources  destined  to  make  Chattanooga  one  of  the  commercial  centres  of  the 
country  do  not  abound.  Along  the  "Great  Unaka  chain,  in  those  counties  border- 
ing upon  the  Smoky,  over  which  we  passed  on  our  way  to  the  North  Carolina 
mountains,  lie  some  of  the  richest  sections  of  the  "eastern  iron  belt" — which 
extends  northward  into  Virginia  and  southward  into  Georgia.  In  the  "  Valley," 
that  rich  and  populous  quarter  of  Tennessee,  on  whose  ridges  and  in  whose 
nooks  are  raised  some  of  the  noblest  physical  specimens  of  the  American  man,  the 
mineral  development  seems  incredible.  In  what  is  known  as  the  "Dyestone 
Belt"  the  immense  layers  of  red  hematite  run  without  a  break  for  150  miles,/ 
swelling  sometimes  to  eight  or  ten  feet  in  thickness,  but  never  sinking  below  five. 
One  hundred  pounds  of  this  stratified  red-iron  rock,  soft  and  easily  crushed,  will 
yield  seventy  pounds  of  pure  iron.  It  is  the  same  ore  which,  outcropping  in 
Virginia,  has  for  years  supplied  the  splendid  furnaces  of  Eastern  Pennsylvania, 
and  extending  through  North-eastern  Georgia  into  Alabama,  is  known  as  the 
"  Red  Mountain  "  ore  of  the  latter  State.  And  this  grand  belt  lies  at  the  very 
base  of  the  coal-measures  ! 

The  East  Tennessee  valley  extends  north-east  and  south-west  about  280 
miles  from  Chattanooga  to  the  Virginia  line.  North-west  of  it  is  the  Cumberland 
table-land,  which  Andrew  Jackson  was  wont  to  declare  would  one  day  be  the 
garden  of  the  United  States;  and  one  of  the  outlines  of  this  plateau,  extending 
from  the  vicinity  of  Chattanooga  to  Cumberland  Gap,  is  known  as  "Walden's 
Ridge."  This  is  the  south-eastern  limit  of  the  great  Appalachian  coal-field,  which 
covers  6,000  square  miles — considerably  more  than  the  entire  coal  area  of  Great 
Britain.  All  the  ridges  in  the  "Valley  "  contain  minerals;  they  are  ribbed  with 
iron  ore  of  every  variety.  In  some  cases  the  veins  of  red  fossiliferous  ore  extend 
under  the  coal-fields. 

The  numerous  rivers  Heading  in  the  North  Carolina  and  Western  Virginia 
mountains  drain  north-west  toward  the  Tennessee,  and  form  natural  highways 
upon  which  to  bear  the  ore  to  the  beds  of  coal.  The  stores  of  red  and 
brown  hematites  in  the  Alleghany  chain  and  the  Cumberland  range  are  abso- 
lutely inexhaustible.  '  This  grand  mineral-field  is  blessed  with  a  delicious 
climate,  which  the  high  mountain  walls  render  temperate  in  winter  and  cool  and 
entirely  free  from  malaria  in  summer. 

Before  i860  numbers  of  furnaces  were  worked  in  the  "  Dyestone  Belt,"  and 
excellent  ore   was  produced ;    but  an  especial  impetus  has  been  given    to    the 


THE   ROCKWOOD   I  RON  -  FURN  AC  E  . 


533 


production  of  that  section  since  the  war.  General  John  T.  Wilder,  of  Ohio, 
while  campaigning  under  Rosecrans  against  Chattanooga,  in  1863,  at  the 
head  of  a  brigade  of  mounted  infantry,  became  interested  in  the  hills,  from 
which  might  be  blasted  thousands  of  tons  of  ore  in  a  day,  in  the  great  veins 
of  hematites,  sometimes  covering  hundreds  of  acres,  and  in  that  mighty  stretch 
of  200  miles  along  the  now  famous  ridge,  where  coal  and  iron  lie  only  half 
a  mile  apart,  with  massive  limestone  between  them.  When  he  laid  by  his 
sword,  he  continued  the  study  of  these  mineral  deposits,  and  after  purchasing 
the  site  on  which  the  village  and  furnaces  of  Rockwood  now  stand,  associated 
with  himself  a  company  of  capitalists,   and  in  1867   organized  the  Roane  Iron 


The  Rockwood  Iron -Furnaces — Eastern  Tennessee. 

Company,  with  a  capital  of  $1,000,000.  This  company  purchased  the  rail- 
mill  at  Chattanooga,  which  had  been  built  by  the  Federal  Government;  tun- 
neled the  Cumberland  mountain  for  coal ;  and  in  1 868  began  to  manufacture 
pig-iron  cheaper  than  it  has  been  made  elsewhere  in  the  country,  and  to 
supply  it  to  the  rolling-mills,  sending  it  down  the  Tennessee  river  in  steamers 
and  barges.*  Rockwood  is  now  a  brisk  village  of  2,000  inhabitants,  of  whom 
about   one-half  are  workmen  in  the  furnaces  and  the  coal  mines.      It   is   situ- 

*  According  to  the  census  of  1870,  there  were  then  in  Tennessee  fourteen  establishments 
manufacturing  pig-iron,  with  twenty-three  blast-furnaces  and  $1,103,750  capital,  producing 
28,688  tons,  worth  $1,147,707.  There  were  eighteen  rolling-mills  with  a  capital  of  $253,750, 
producing  rolled  iron  worth  $369,222,  and  thirty-three  manufactories  of  cast-iron,  with  a  capital 
of  $331,392,  the  products  of  which  annually  amounted  to  about  $500,000.  The  number  of 
establishments  has  much  increased  since  that  time. 


534 


MATERIAL      PROGRESS. 


ated    seventy    miles    north-east    of    Chattanooga,    in    the    heart    of    a    rugged 
mountain  region.* 

The  energetic  Western  men  who  have  it  in  charge   are    confident    that    in 
a  few  years  the  city  of   Chattanooga  will  rival    Pittsburg    in  growth,  for  they 


The  "John  Ross  House,"  near  Chattanooga.     Residence  of  one  of  the  old  Cherokee  Landholders. 

claim  that  they  can  manufacture  iron  at  least  ten  or  twelve  dollars  per  ton 
cheaper  than  it  can  be  made  anywhere  else  in  the  United  States.  It  would 
certainly  be  remarkable  if  a  mineral  region  so  vast  and  well  stocked  as  that 
of  Northern  Georgia,  Northern  Alabama,  and  Eastern  Tennessee, — in  the 
midst  of  which  Chattanooga  stands, — should  not  produce  at  least  one  city  of 
a  hundred  thousand  inhabitants  within  a  few  years.  The  new  aspirant  for 
the  honors  of  rapid  growth  has  made  sterling  progress.  Cotton- mills  and  car 
works  are  springing  up  beside  the  rolling-mills  and  foundries ;  many  fine 
mansions  already  grace  the  principal  residence  streets,  and  hundreds  of 
mechanics  are  building  neat  cottages  along  the  slopes  on  both  sides  of  the 
Tennessee.  Swiss  ,  capital  is  engaged  in  the  manufacture  of  cotton,  and 
English  investors   are    carefully  studying   the    iron  and  coal  fields  with  a  view 

*  Twenty-five  thousand  tons  of  ore  are  mined  at  Rockwood  yearly,  and  about  1 2,000  tons  of 
pig-iron  are  sent  thence  to  Chattanooga,  Atlanta,  St.  Louis,  and  Louisville.  The  rolling-mill  at 
Chattanooga  produces  about  15,000  tons  of  rails  annually.  The  impetus  given  to  the  growth  of 
Chattanooga  by  the  establishment  of  this  mill  and  the  Vulcan  Iron  Works  has  been  tremendous. 
The  price  paid  the  Government  for  the  rolling-mill  and  145  acres  of  land  at  Chattanooga  by 
the  Roane  Iron  Company,  was  $225,000.  The  patent  puddling  apparatus  of  an  Englishman 
named  Danks  —  an  apparatus  which  is  expected  to  revolutionize  iron  manufacture  by  an 
immense  saving  in  cost — has  been  introduced  into  the  works.  The  cost  of  ore  at  the  Rock- 
wood  furnaces  is  about  $2  per  ton  ;  that  of  coal,  $1.40  per  ton ;  limestone,  eighty  cents.  It  is 
not  astonishing,  in  view  of  these  prices,  that  the  company  hope  eventually  to  manufacture  rails 
and  deliver  them  in  Pittsburg  cheaper  than  they  can  be  made  there. 


ACTIVITY      IN      CHATTANOOGA. 


535 


to  finally  erecting  large  rolling-mills  in  the  city;  banks,  good  hotels,  well-planned 
streets,  and  excellent  schools  and  churches  have  arisen  like  magic  within  seven 
years  ;  and  the  constant  stream  of  produce  transferred  from  the  river  to  the  rail- 
roads gives  an  activity  and  feverishness  to  the  aspect  of  the  streets,  at  certain 
seasons,  which  is  quite  inspiring.  Even  within  the  town  limits  iron  ore  is  to  be 
found.  It  lies  in  the  north-west  slopes  of  "Cameron  Hill,"  a  high  bluff  from  which 
one  can  overlook  the  Tennessee  and  the  busy  town  stretched  along  its  banks, 
even  to  the  base  of  "  Lookout."  In  the  Eastern,  Dyestone,  and  Western  iron 
belts  of  Tennessee  there  were  more  small  furnaces  before  the  war  than  at  present; 
but  it  is  doubtful  if  so  much  iron  was  manufactured  then  as  now.  Capital  is  fast 
finding  out  the  best  locations  for  furnaces  and  rolling-mills  in  each  of  the  three 
States  whose  commercial  centre  Chattanooga  properly  is,  and  hundreds  of  thou- 
sands of  acres  have  recently  been  purchased  by  companies,  who  will  probably 
develop  them  within  the  next  five  years. 


Catching  a  "  Tarpin.: 


LX. 


LOOKOUT     MOUNTAIN-^THE     BATTLES     AROUND      CHATTANOOGA. 
KNOXVILLE  — EASTERN     TENNESSEE. 

MOST  persons  in  this  country  or  in  Europe  who  have  heard  of  Lookout 
mountain  since  "  the  war "  have  also  been  told  of  the  "  battle  above 
the  clouds."  It  was  my  fortune  to  scale  the  remarkable  palisade  at  a  time  when 
the  broad  plateau  which  runs  along  its  summit  was  literally  enshrouded  in 
formidable  mists.  The  rain  was  falling  in  torrents  as,  with  two  companions,  I 
galloped  through  the  little  town  at  the  foot  of  the  mountain  ;  but  ere  we  had 
scaled  the  winding  road,  the  shower  was  over,  and  a  brisk  wind  began  to  stir  the 


View  from  Lookout  Mountain,  near  Chattanooga. 


mists.  We  could  see  little  but  the  ledges  along  whose  sides  the  route  ran,  but  as 
we  arrived  nearly  at  the  summit,  the  mist-curtain  was  lifted  for  an  instant,  and 
revealed  to  us  a  delicious  expanse  of  valley,  with  sunlight's  smiles  here  and  there 
chasing  away  the  rain's  tears.  Then  we  were  shrouded  in  again;  and  our  horses, 
apparently  inspired  by  the  gloomy  grandeur  of  the  occasion,  rattled  furiously 
along  the  hard  roads,  over  which  the  boughs  hung  uncomfortably  near  our  heads. 
The  red  sandy  clay  nourishes  enormous  pines,  whose  roots  have  here  and  there 
been  disturbed  by  the  sandstone  bowlders,  and  stretched  out  their  fibres  in  a  des- 
perate grasp;  beside  the  pathways  great  blocks  of  stone,  carved  by  the  storms  and 
polished  by  the  winds,  are  scattered.  We  galloped  nearly  to  the  massive  perpen- 
dicular wall  which  arises  directly  out  of  the  valley,  and  disdainfully  frowns  down 


THE      VIEW      FROM      LOOKOUT      MOUNTAIN. 


537 


upon  the  Tennessee,  spurned  from   its  base   fourteen  hundred  feet  below  ;  and 

tethering   our   horses,   approached  to  the  very  edge.      There  we  seemed  shut 

off  from   all   the  world.      Now  and    then    a    hum    from  the    valley — the    growl 

of  a    locomotive    or    the    rolling    of  wheels — came  faintly  up ;    we  heard   the 

cow-bells   and    the  bleating  of  the 

sheep  on  the  hill-sides  behind  us ;   and 

just   as    we    were    trying    to   imagine 

how    "  the  battle "    must    have    been, 

the    wind    came    sweeping    away    the 

mist-curtain,    and — we    beheld    the 

whole ! 

From  "  Umbrella  Rock  "  we  saw 
"  the  Moccasin,"  that  curious  point  of 
land  made  by  the  Tennessee's  abrupt 
turn.  The  streets  and  houses  of  Chat- 
tanooga seemed  like  toys,  or  little 
blocks  of  wood.  Mission  Ridge  was 
an  insignificant  blue  line.  The  Ten- 
nessee seems  to  turn  in  deference  to 
Chattanooga,  for  it  might  readily  in- 
undate it,  and  has  once  compelled 
the  citizens  to  navigate  their  streets 
in  boats.  Beyond  it,  northward  and 
westward,  the  eye  encounters  forests 
and  ridges  where  the  mountains  seem  to  have  been  split  asunder  by  some 
convulsion  of  nature — until  at  last,  on  the  east,  the  Cumberland  range  springs 
up,  and  forbids  you  to  choose  any  other  horizon.  Southward,  beyond  broad 
and  quiet  vales,  richly  cultured,  are  the  mountains  of  Georgia,  and  westward 
the  tree- crested  ridges  in  Alabama. 

We  clambered  down  a  flight  of  wooden  steps  to  a  secure  point  of  the  crags, 
and  looked  over  the  valley  out  of  which  Hooker  hurried  his  troops  on  to  the 
summit  when  he  broke  the  left  of  Bragg's  formidable  army.  It  was  a  wild 
struggle,  a  running  and  leaping  fight  among  rocks  and  behind  trees,  when  men 
carried  their  lives  in  their  hands,  and  their  swords  in  their  teeth,  as  they  wormed 
their  way  through  the  fastnesses,  and  then  made  their  charge  upon  the  foe  so 
strongly  intrenched  above  the  very  clouds,  upon  "  Point  Lookout." 

The  old  Government  hospital  still  stands  on  its  picturesque  bluff,  deserted 
now  save  by  curious  visitors;  here  and  there  along  the  broad  plateau  are  scattered 
comfortable  houses,  and  log-cabins ;  good  roads  lead  into  the  northern  counties 
of  Georgia.  Near  "Rock  City," — a  gigantic  series  of  galleries  in  disrupted  stone 
pinnacles  which  rise  amid  the  ragged  brush  and  saplings, — is  another  enormous 
uplift  of  limestone,  from  which  one  may  see  the  whole  of  Chattanooga  valley, 
the  Raccoon  and  Lookout  ranges,  and  the  battle-field  of  Chickamauga.  De- 
scending five  or  six  miles  from  the  point  where  the  turnpike  from  the  city 
reaches  the  summit,  into    the  valley  of  Walker   county,   in   Northern   Georgia, 


Umbrella  Rock,  on  Lookout  Mountain. 


538 


LAKE      SECLUSION- 


IATTLES     AROUND      CHATTANOOGA. 


one  comes  to  a  region  of  precipices  and  waterfalls,  of  tarns  and  caves,  of 
landslides  and  bluffs. 

Near  "  Lake  Seclusion,"  an  apparently  bottomless  well,  sunk  a  hundred  feet 
below  the  surrounding  rocks,  the  scenery  is  exquisite.  In  autumn  the  foliage  on 
the  cliffs  bordering  the  stream  which  flows  through  this  lake,  and  plunges  farther 
on  down  a  ravine  in  a  blinding  spray-cloud,  which  the  Indians  named  "  Lulah 
Falls,"  is  so  rich  in  color  that  the  whole  country  seems  aflame.  From  one  or 
two  of  the  highest  points  the  ragged  ends  of  the  Lookout  plateau,  and  the 
pleasant  expanse  of  valley  beyond,  may  be  seen. 

Riding  day  by  day  along  the  broad  tables  of  the  Cumberland,  in  the  nooks 
on  the  banks  of  the  Tennessee,  and  up  and  over  the  ridges  near  the  scene  of 
Chickamauga,  it  was  pleasant  to  hear  anew  the  story  of  the  great  fight  around 
Chattanooga  from  the  lips  of  those  who  had  been  participants.  But  it  was  all 
unreal,    dreamlike.      When  we    stood   with    our   feet  in  half-filled  rifle-pits,    or 

among  the  shattered  and 
cannon -scorched  tree- 
trunks  on  the  field  of 
combat,  it  was  still  remote, 
indefinite.  I  fancy  even 
the  natives  of  the  country 
round  about  only  remem- 
ber the  whole  struggle 
vaguely  now  and  then ; 
although  jl  Chattanooga 
man  once  said  to  a  new- 
comer from  the  West  that 
when  he  wanted  some 
paper  which  the  invading 
army  had  burned  up  for 
Looking  from  "Lookout  Cave."  hini)  or    remembered   the 

losses  of  property  he  had  suffered,  he  "hated  the  whole  Yankee  nation  for  a 
minute  or  two  ;  "  but  he  added,  "it 's  only  for  a  minute  or  two,  and  those 
minutes    don't    come   as   often   as  they  did." 

Chattanooga's  possession  by  the  Union  army  cost  many  thousands  of  lives ; 
but  it  opened  the  way  to  Atlanta  and  the  sea.  The  line  which  stretched  from 
Lookout's  northern  crag  to  Mission  Ridge,  on  the  night  of  November  24th,  1863, 
might  have  been  quadrupled  in  strength  if  the  dead  warriors  from  Murfreesboro 
and  Chickamauga  could  have  been  marshaled  into  it.  There  was  an  especial 
bitterness  in  the  struggle  for  this  rocky  gateway.  After  the  staggering  blows 
which  both  armies  had  received  in  the  terrible  fight  by  Stone  river,  Bragg  and 
Rosecrans  were  both  willing  enough  to  rest  for  a  little ;  but  when  Bragg  had 
withdrawn,  and  it  was  evident  that  his  formidable  campaign,  which  had  carried 
terror  even  to  the  gates  of  Louisville  and  Cincinnati,  was  at  an  end,  the  Union 
standards  led  the  way  to  Chattanooga.  There,  strongly  intrenched,  Bragg 
defied    his    old   antagonist.     On   the  morning  of  August   21st,    1863,    General 


A      WAR      REMINISCENCE. 


539 


Wilder,  commanding  the  advance  of  Rosecrans'  army,  began  shelling  the  city 
which  he  now  makes  his  home,  from  the  hills  at  the  north  side  of  the  river. 

Meantime  day  by  day  the  Federal  forces  were  investing  Chattanooga,  having 
crossed  the  Tennessee  at  Bridgeport,  at  Battle  Creek,  and  at  Shell  Mound.  On 
the  4th  of  September  Burnside  occupied  Knoxville.  Bragg  moved  the  Con- 
federate forces  away  toward  Dalton,  and  Rosecrans  entered  the  town,  and 
followed  the  enemy,  who  turned  fiercely,  and  stood  at  bay  on  Chickamauga. 
Longstreet's  Virginians  and  Bragg's  hardy  army  fought  with  the  energy  of  des- 
peration; and  if,  on  that  memorable  19th  of  September,  when  the  combatants 
waded  in  blood,  Longstreet  had  had  another  than  Thomas  to  encounter,  he  might 
have  carried  the  Federal  left  which  he  so  furiously  attacked.  Thomas  drove 
Longstreet  back  a  mile  or  two,  but,  as  the  centre  failed  to  keep  pace  with  his 
advance,  he  was  compelled  to  halt. 

Then  Bragg  fell  upon  the  forces  under  command  of  McCook  and  Crittenden, 
and  the  waves  of  battle  flowed  to  and  fro  until  night,  when  the  Federal  army 
still  held  its  own  ground.  Early  in  the  morning  Thomas  had  the  enemy  once 
more  hurled  at  him,  but  repulsed  him  as  before.  The  Union  right  and  centre 
were  driven  back ;  McCook  was  confused  and  demoralized ;  Thomas  alone  stood 
like  a  rock,  and  kept  the  enemy  at  arm's  length  until  night,  when  he  fell  back  to 
Rossville,  to  be  attacked  again,  and  to  once  more  repulse  his  foes  the  next  day. 
Fifteen  thousand  men  had  been  lost  to  the  Union  army,  in  killed,  wounded  and 
missing,  in  these  two  days ; 
and  the  Confederates  had  lost 
18,000.  The  field  of  Chicka- 
mauga was  piled  with  the  dead, 
and  the  rivulets  literally  ran 
blood. 

The  flushed  and  defiant 
enemy  now  stood  ready  to 
again  fall  upon  Chattanooga. 
They  had  struck  some  terrible 
blows.  Rosecrans,  McCook, 
and  Crittenden,  were  removed 
from  command.  The  Confed- 
erate forces  occupied  Lookout 
mountain  and  controlled  the 
valley,  cutting  off  rail  and  river 
communication.  Provisions 
were  hauled  over  the  rough 
hill-roads  and  through  the  nar- 
row   passes     On     the    north    Side  "Rock  City,"  Lookout  Mountain.     [Page  537.] 

of  the  river,  for  seventy  miles,  by  animals  worn  to  skeletons,  and  by  men  who 
were  half  starved;  and  so,  on  mountain  and  in  forest,  along  the  valleys  and  the 
rivers,  the  vigilant  combatants  stood,  patiently  awaiting  the  next  move,  when 
there  came  upon  the  scene  a  man  named  Grant. 
35 


54Q 


THE      OPENING      OF     THE      GATEWAY. 


As  soon  as  General  Grant  had  taken  command  of  the  military  division  of  the 
Mississippi,  communication,  both  by  river  and  rail,  was  gradually  re-established, 
and  Chattanooga  was  unlocked.  Sherman  reinforced  the  army  there  in  mid- 
November.  Grant's  next  move  was  to  allow  Longstreet  to  do  what  he  had 
several  times  unsuccessfully  tried,  pass  the  Federal  army  to  the  east  of  Chatta- 
nooga and  march  against  Burnside  and  the  army  of  the  Ohio.  Longstreet  had 
20,000  splendid  soldiers,  and  Burnside  far  less ;  it  might  fare  hardly  with  the 
latter,  but  it  was  one  of  the  moves  on  Grant's  chessboard,  and  there  was  nothing 
to  be  said.     It  resulted  in  checkmating  Bragg  at  Mission  Ridge. 

Twenty  thousand  men  having  been  taken  from  the  line  which  the  Con- 
federates had  stretched  along  the  Lookout  plateau, — eastwardly  across  Chatta- 
nooga valley  to  Mission  Ridge,  at  or  near  Rossville  Gap,  and  thence  northwardly 


View  from  Wood's  Redoubt,  Chattanooga. 

on  the  Ridge  toward  Chickamauga  creek, — by  the  departure  of  Longstreet,  that 
line  was  attacked.  The  plan  was  to  assault  the  wings,  to  cause  Bragg  to  throw 
large  forces  to  their  protection,  and  then  to  break  the  centre. 

Hooker  and  Sherman  began  working  in  earnest.  The  24th  of  November  saw 
the  left  of  the  enemy  driven  from  Lookout,  and  the  right  forced  out  of  its 
position.  Next  day  the  wave  of  war  swept  up  Mission  Ridge,  over  the 
charming  slopes  where  now  the  great  National  cemetery  is  situated,  up  to  the 
summit;  and  at  sunset  General  Grant  moved  his  head-quarters  from  Wood's 
Redoubt  to  the  Ridge,  which  in  the  morning  had  been  guarded  by  sentinels  in 
gray.     The  enemy  was  next  day  driven  from  his  base  of  supplies. 

The  siege  was  over.     The  pathway  to  the  sea  lay  before  Sherman. 

Wood's  Redoubt  is  still  one  of  the  most  striking  objects  in  the  valley  of  Chat- 
tanooga. Standing  on  the  grass-grown  ramparts  one  has  an  exquisite  view  of 
Lookout,  the  Tennessee's  abrupt  recoil  at  its  base,  and  the  sharp  peak  of  Eagle 
Point,  and  can  note  the  two  turns  of  the  river,  with  the  Moccasin  Point  between, 
around  whose  southern  bend,  on  a  November  midnight  in  1863,  Sherman 
moved  3,000  soldiers  in  pontoons.  Northward,  and  opposite  the  redoubts,  over- 
hanging the  Tennessee,  is  Cameron  Hill,  from  whose  wind-swept  height  one  can 
look  down  upon  Chattanooga's  busy  streets  as  from  a  balloon.  On  the  slopes 
adjacent   to  Cameron    Hill  there  are  many  handsome    residences,   and  Wood's 


THE     UNIVERSITY     OF     THE     SOUTH.  541 

Redoubt  itself  will  in  a  few  years  be  lost  sight  of  under  the  foundations  of  some 
charming  villa.  On  many  of  the  hills  a  faint  outline  of  the  old  fortifications  may 
be  traced ;  but  they  will  soon  have  vanished  forever. 

It  would  be  difficult  to  imagine  more  romantic  approaches  than  those  through 
which  the  Nashville  and  Chattanooga  railroad  finds  its  way  to  the  latter  city. 
For  seventy-five  or  eighty  miles  it  runs  through  a  bold,  mountainous  country  ; 
but  about  twenty-five  miles  before  reaching  Chattanooga  it  bends  downward  into 
the  mighty  passes  among  the  Cumberlands  in  Northern  Alabama,  and  crawling 
under  rocks  and  on  the  brinks  of  chasms,  now  running  on  the  edges  of  valleys, 
clothed  in  perfect  forests,  and  now  shooting  into  long  tunnels,  works  its  way 
to  the  valley.  As  one  approaches  Lookout  by  this  route,  the  effect  is  extremely 
imposing ;  a  new  and  striking  view  is  presented  at  each  instant ;  the  cliffs  seem 
to  present  no  outlet ;  the  train  is  apparently  about  to  be  cast  down  some  yawn- 
ing ravine,  when  one  sees  the  continuation  of  the  route. 

Sixty-two  miles  from  Chattanooga,  on  a  spur  of  the  Cumberland,  at  Sewanee,, 
in  Tennessee,  is  situated  the  "  University  of  the  South."  This  remarkable  insti- 
tution owes  its  origin  to  the  late  Bishop  Leonidas  Polk,  of  Louisiana.  He  desired 
to  concentrate  the  interests  of  the  several  Southern  dioceses  of  the  Episcopal 
Church  upon  one  school  where  religious  education  might  be  given  in  a  thorough 
manner;  and  in  1836  he  issued  an  address  to  the  bishops  of  the  various 
States  of  the  South,  proposing  to  establish  a  Christian  University.  The  result 
was  a  large  assembly  of  bishops  and  lay  delegates  at  a  meeting  on  Lookout 
Mountain's  summit,  in  1837,  a^  which  the  general  principles  of  union  were 
discussed ;  and  the  city  of  Sewanee  was  chosen  some  time  thereafter.  The 
Tennessee  Legislature  granted  a  liberal  charter,  and  a  domain  of  ten  thousand 
acres  of  land  had  been  secured,  five  hundred  thousand  dollars  obtained  toward 
an  endowment,  and  the  corner-stone  of  the  central  building  laid,  when  the  war 
began.  In  1866  very  little  remained  save  the  domain;  but  in  1868,  after  some 
aid  from  England,  the  University  was  definitely  established,  and  the  more  im- 
portant of  the  schools  are  now  well  organized,  with  able  professors  at  their  head. 
The  institution  is  under  the  perpetual  control  of  a  board  of  trustees  composed  of 
the  bishops  of  the  various  Southern  States,  the  senior  bishop  being,  ex  officio. 
Chancellor  of  the  University. 

The  location  is  charming.  The  University  was  started  in  the  midst  of  an 
almost  unbroken  forest,  but  has  now  grouped  around  it  a  pleasant  and  refined 
community.  It  is  about  nine  miles  from  the  Nashville  and  Chattanooga  railroad,, 
and  the  great  tunnel  on  that  road  passes  under  its  lands.  From  Cowan,  on  the 
line,  to  Sewanee,  the  local  coal  mining  company  has  built  a  good  railroad.  The 
Sewanee  plateau  is  2000  feet  above  the  sea-level,  in  a  richly-varied  country, 
abounding  in  cascades,  ravines,  groves,  and  uplands. 

There  is  an  abundance  of  building  material  in  the  quarries  of  gray,  blue, 
dove-colored  and  brown  limestone,  which  lie  beside  the  Sewanee  Company's 
railroad,  and  as  soon  as  the  present  insufficient  endowment  is  enlarged,  the  erec- 
tion of  permanent  buildings  will  be  begun.  There  are  chalybeate  springs  in  the 
vicinity,  and  the  slopes  of  the  Cumberland  here  are  admirably  adapted  for  grape 


542 


PEEP      INTO     A     NEGRO'S      CABIN! 


culture.  Nearly  300  students  are  gathered  into  the  various  schools.  Bishop 
Quintard,  of  Tennessee,  has  done  the  University  great  service  in  collecting 
money  in  England  for  its  establishment,  and  he  and  others  are  now  anxiously 
trying  to  secure  $500,000  as  an  enlargement  fund. 

Riding  through  the  wooded  country  on  the  Tennessee's  banks,  not  far  from 
Chattanooga,  one  autumn  day,  we  dismounted,  a  large  and  hungry  party,  before 
the  door  of  a  log-cabin,  built  on  a  hill-side,  and  hailed  the  inmates.  A  fat  negro 
woman  appeared  at  the  corner  of  the  rude  veranda,  and  four  plump  negro  babies 
regarded  us  through  the  crevices  between  the  logs  with  round-eyed  fear. 
"  Reckoned  she  could  n't  give  us  no  dinner — no  way;"  finally  was  very  positive, 
and  said  "she  had  nothing  in  the  house."     But  persistence  was  rewarded  by 


ga. 


On  the  Tennessee  River,  near  Cha 

permission  to  return  in  an  hour,  and  she  would  see  what  could  be  improvised. 
At  the  hour's  end  we  found  in  the  cabin  a  rough  table  spread  with  bacon,  and 
corn-bread  just  baked  in  the  ashes;  a  few  sweet  potatoes  were  presently  proffered, 
and  some  tea  was  made.  By  the  fireside,  rocking  a  black  cherub,  was  another 
woman,  younger  and  more  comely  than  our  host.  These  two  cultivated  a  little 
field;  their  "husbands,"  or  the  men  of  the  house, —  for  marriage  is  not  always 
considered  necessary  among  the  negroes, — were  away  at  work  in  another 
county;  and  the  children  rolled  in  the  dirt,  and  had  no  thoughts  of  school.  It 
was  the  very  rudest  and  most  incult  life  imaginable;  the  cabin  was  cleanly, 
but  primitive  in  all  its  furnishings ;  the  round  of  these  people's  lives  seemed 
to  be  sleeping  and  waking,  with  a  struggle  between  morning  and   evening  to 


IMPROVEMENT      OF      THE      TENNESSEE. 


543 


get  enough  to  put  into  their  mouths ;  they  had  no  thought  of  thrift  or  prog- 
ress. Now  and  then  they  went  to  a  religious  gathering,  and,  perhaps,  had 
"experiences,"  and  were  converted;  then  they  gradually  relapsed  into  their 
dull  condition. 

The    mountain    roads    in  all    the  section    bordering    on   the  Tennessee   are 
beautiful.     There  are  many  bold  bluffs,  one  and  two  hundred  feet  high,  which 


The   "Suck,"  on  the  Tennessee  River. 

overlook  the  stream ;  and  one  comes  upon  stretches  of  fertile  fields.  The 
inhabitants,  white  or  black,  are  invariably  civil  and  courteous.  The  farmers, 
clad  in  homespun,  mounted  on  raw-boned  horses,  are  willing  and  eager  to 
compare  notes  with  strangers.  They  have  caught  a  touch  of  the  inspiration 
Chattanooga  diffuses  around  itself,  and  carefully  explore  their  lands  in  the 
hope  of  finding  minerals. 

The  Tennessee  is  receiving  some  improvement  here  and  there.  At  the  point 
called  the  "Suck,"  where  the  waters  rush  through  a  gorge  in  the  mountains,  over 
a  rocky  bed  and  in  a  shallow  channel,  we  saw  dredge-boats  at  work.  The  river 
has  ordinarily  more  water  than  the  Ohio,  and  a  permanent  bed,  with  little 
or  no  sand  or  gravel,  so  that  there  is  no  danger  of  the  formation  of  those  bars 
which  obstruct  the  navigation  of  so  many  Western  rivers. 

The  attention  of  the  Government  has  been  directed  toward  the  needed 
improvements  ever  since  1828,  and  the  ruins  of  the  Muscle  Shoals  canal,  which 
originally  cost  $700,000,  testify  to  the  thoroughness  of  the  plans  then  made.  If 
that  canal  were  put  in  condition  again,  and  the  obstructions  between  Muscle 
Shoals  and  Knoxville  were  removed,  America  would  be  the  richer  by  one  grand 
water  highway. 

Knoxville,  once  the  capital  of  Tennessee,  and  one  of  the  most  illustrious 
and  venerable  of  its  communities,  is  situated  on  the  Holston  river  about  100 
miles  above  Chattanooga.  It  is  to-day  as  actively  engaged  in  developing  the 
mighty  resources  of  Eastern  Tennessee  as  is  its  sister  of  the  valley,  and  a 
generous  rivalry  exists  between  the  two  towns,  represented  in  the  newspapers 
by  good-humored  raillery,  in  which  the  editors  of  both  cities  seem  admirable 
proficients.  Five  miles  east  of  Knoxville  the  lovely  French  Broad  river  empties 
its  dancing  and  frothing  current,  released  from  the  passes  of  the  North  Carolina 
mountains,   into  the  Tennessee.     Knoxville  was  named  for  that  worthy  Knox 


544 


KNOXVILLE      AND      ITS      HISTORY. 


who  was  Secretary  of  War  under  the  presidency  of  Washington.  The  town 
dates  from  1794,  when  Colonel  White,  proprietor  of  the  lands,  laid  it  out  into 
lots.  Three  years  before,  on  the  5  th  of  December,  1791,  in  the  midst  of 
Indian  massacres  and  battles,  the  first  Tennessee  newspaper  was  issued  by 
George  Roulstone.  Although  it  was  printed  at  Rogersville,  it  was  called  The 
Knoxville  Gazette,  and  was  identified  with  the  interests  of  the  then  territorial 
seat  of  government. 

The  section  of  which  Knoxville  thus  became  the  chief  town  has  a  most  roman- 
tic history.  In  1760  there  was  not  a  single  civilized  inhabitant  in  Tennessee.  A 
few  daring  woodsmen  pushed  into  the  wilderness  a  few  years  later,  and  founded 
settlements  on  the  Watauga  and  the  Holston,  to  which  nocked  settlers  from  North 


A  Negro  Cabin  on  the  bank  of  the  Tennessee.      [Page  542.] 

Carolina  and  Virginia.  North  Carolina,  in  those  days  a  province,  was  disquieted 
by  taxation  which  she  considered  illegal ;  and  thousands  who  had  been  com- 
pelled to  fly  from  their  homes,  because  they  had  actively  resisted  the  oppression 
of  Governor  Tryon,  took  refuge  with  the  adventurers  at  Watauga.  In  a  few 
years  the  surrounding  country  re-echoed  to  the  blows  of  the  woodsmen's  axes, 
and  the  Indians  began  to  regard  their  encroachments  with  alarm  and  resentment. 
But  shortly  before  the  outbreak  of  the  Revolution,  and  the  downfall  of  royal 
government  in  North  Carolina,  the  members  of  the  Watauga  Association  had  a 
peaceable  meeting  with  the  Cherokees  and  their  chiefs,  and  purchased  from  them, 
for  ^2,000,    all   the  lands    on    which  they  had  settled.      The    Elizabethton    of 


THE      STATE     OF     "FRANKLIN.  545 

to-day,  a  little  mountain  hamlet,  occupies  the  site  of  the  old  Watauga.  Shortly- 
after  the  purchase,  the  Cherokees  began  open  hostilities,  and  the  Tennessean  had 
then,  as  for  many  a  long  year  thereafter,  to  risk  his  life  daily.  Battles  ensued ; 
the  Indians  organized  expeditions  to  cut  off  and  annihilate  the  infant  colonies ; 
war  raged  through  all  the  North  Carolina  mountains  and  along  the  Unaka  range. 
The  result  was  an  invasion  of  the  Cherokee  towns  by  the  militia  of  North  Car- 
olina and  the  settlements.  Eighteen  hundred  men,  armed  with  rifles,  tomahawks, 
and  butcher  knives, —  thus  saith  the  ancient  chronicle, — marched  across  the 
Holston  and  the  French  Broad,  and  drove  the  Indians  everywhere  before  them. 
A  pious  chaplain  accompanied  this  little  army  of  invasion,  and  was  the  first 
Christian  minister  that  ever  preached  in  Tennessee.  Immigration  flowed  after 
the  army,  and  the  Indians  were  dismayed.  The  Watauga  settlement,  triumph- 
ant, petitioned  for  annexation  to  North  Carolina,  and  its  prayer  was  granted. 
The  Legislature  of  that  State,  in  1777,  founded  Washington  county,  which  occu- 
pied the  whole  district  now  included  within  the  present  boundaries  of  Tennessee. 
Two  years  later  explorers  had  planted  a  field  with  corn  on  the  spot  where  the 
present  city  of  Nashville  stands. 

The  recital  of  the  border  wars,  and  of  dashing  expeditions  down  the  Ten- 
nessee river,  would  require  volumes.  Men  sprang  up,  rude,  hardy,  brave — the 
outgrowth  of  their  time ;  their  brains  were  filled  with  visions  of  empire  ;  they 
fought  by  day  and  planned  by  night.  After  the  independence  of  the  United 
States  had  been  acknowledged  by  Great  Britain,  each  State  endeavored  to  relieve 
the  indebtedness  of  the  country,  by  cessions  to  Congress,  of  their  unappropriated 
lands ;  and,  accordingly,  North  Carolina  ceded  her  new  acquisition,  now  known 
as  Tennessee.  This  made  political  orphans  of  our  brave  Watauga  settlers  and 
their  followers,  so  they  forthwith  created  an  independent  State  called  Franklin, 
which  was  ruled  over  by  an  energetic  and  daring  man  named  Sevier,  and 
maintained  a  stormy  existence  from  1784  to  1788,  during  much  of  which  time 
it  was  considered  by  the  Government  of  North  Carolina  as  practically  in  revolt. 
Sevier  was  engaged  in  many  a  daring  battle  and  mountain  skirmish ;  was  once 
carried  off  by  his  friends  at  the  moment  a  court  in  North  Carolina  was  trying 
him  for  his  offenses ;  and  was,  after  Franklin  became  United  States  territory, 
sent  to  Congress.  His  associates  in  the  Government  of  Franklin, —  Cocke,  White, 
the  founder  of  Knoxville,  Ramsey,  Doak,  Center,  Reese,  Houston,  Newell, 
Weir  and  Conway, — were,  subsequently,  leading  spirits  in  the  affairs  of  Ten- 
nessee. Greenville,  the  present  home  of  ex-President  Andrew  Johnson,  and 
a  pretty  village  set  down  graciously  among  exquisite  mountains,  was  founded  in 
the  days  of  Franklin,  and  was  the  original  seat  of  government.  In  1785  the 
third  Franklin  convention  was  held  there,  in  a  court-house  built  of  unhewn 
logs,   and   there    the    State    Constitution   was   finally    adopted. 

White's  Fort,  the  location  of  Knoxville,  was,  at  the  time  of  the  fall  of  Frank- 
lin, a  stockaded  settlement,  to  which  settlers  were  rapidly  flocking.  On  the  high 
plateau  which,  extending  southward,  terminated  in  a  bold  bluff  on  the  Holston 
river,  they  saw  excellent  chances  for  defense  ;  and  thus  the  site  of  the  city  was 
determined.      In  1794,  Governor  Blount,  controlling  the  territory  for  the  United 


546 


KNOXVILLE      OF     TO-DAY. 


States,  had  his  cabin  at  Knoxville,  and  was  kept  busy  day  and  night  devising 
measures  for  the  defense  of  the  young  settlement  against  the  thoroughly 
maddened  Cherokees.  At  one  time,  when  the  fighting  force  of .  Knoxville 
was  forty  men,  more  than  fifteen  hundred  Indians  marched  against  the 
town,  but  were  turned  aside  by  some  trivial  circumstance,  and  the  colony 
was  saved. 

As  Knoxville  had  been  the  seat  of  the  Territorial  Government,  so  in  1796  it 
became  the  State  capital,  and  there  the  convention  met,  and  the  first  Constitution 
was  adopted.     There,  too,  the  "Washington  College,  in  honor  of  the  illustrious 


ggj^>—  President  of  the  United  States,"  was  incor- 
porated ;  and  there  General  Jackson,  in 
the  convention,  suggested  that  the  new  State  adopt  the  beautiful  Indian 
name  of  Tennessee.  Knoxville  shared  the  honors  of  the  government  seat 
with  Kingston,  Murfreesboro,  and  Nashville  alternately,  but  in  1 8 1 7  it  became 
the  capital  for  the  last  time.  The  centre  of  population  moved  beyond  the 
Cumberland  mountains,  and  the  State  officials  went  with  it.  To  Knoxville  *were 
left  the  souvenirs  of  the  bloody  times  in  which  it  sprang  into  being,  of  councils 
with  Cherokee  chieftains,  and  struggles  against  their  warriors,  before  the  current 
of  immigration    came. 

Knoxville  is  to-day  a  flourishing  town  with  nearly  15,000  population.  It 
has  more  capital  than  Chattanooga,  but  not  the  same  wonderful  transporta- 
tion facilities.  More  actual  business  is,  however,  probably  done  there ;  the 
town    has    a  large  wholesale    trade,  and    is   a  kind    of  supply    depot    for    the 


THE      PEOPLE      OF      EASTERN      TENNESSEE.  547 

mountains.  On  the  line  of  the  road  from  New  York  to  New  Orleans,  it  has 
hopes  of  other  communication  shortly.  The  subject  of  narrow-gauge  railroads 
has  very  much  interested  the  people  of  Eastern  Tennessee,  and  they  will,  in 
a  few  years,,  traverse  the  valleys  in  all  directions.  A  direct  line  from  Knox- 
ville  to  Macon  in  Georgia  has  been  projected ;  and  the  completion  of  the 
Knoxville  and  Kentucky  roads  would  be  a  great  aid  to  the  local  commerce. 
The  General  Government  is  erecting  a  fine  custom-house  and  post-office  in  the 
city.  Thirty  miles  to  the  northward  are  large  coal-fields,  close  to  veins  of  iron ; 
in  Carter  and  Greene  counties  there  are  iron  mines  which  supply  the  rolling-mills 
and  car-wheel  establishments  at  Knoxville.  There  is  an  extensive  manufacture 
of  glass  in  that  section ;  the  lumber  interests  are  large,  and  considerable 
shipments  are  made  to  New  England.  Five  miles  east  of  Knoxville  is  a 
fine  marble  quarry,  operated  by  capitalists  from  St.  Louis.  At  Coal  creek 
and  Caryville,  some  thirty-five  miles  north  of  the  town,  there  are  extensive 
coal  mining  interests.  The  whole  of  Eastern  Tennessee  offers  the  best  of 
inducements  for  the  practical  farmer,  the  wool- grower,  and  the  investor  in 
mines  and   minerals. 

The  social  condition  of  the  people  varies  with  the  location.  In  previous  chap- 
ters I  have  described  the  dwellers  in  the  mountains  bordering  on  North  Carolina; 
those  living  in  other  remote  counties  are  very  similar  in  habits  and  intelligence. 
The  political  sentiment  is  yet,  as  it  was  during  the  war,  difficult  to  classify. 
There  were  then  hosts  of  uncompromising  Union  men  in  Eastern  Tennessee;  but 
there  were,  also,  many  committed  to  the  interests  of  the  Confederacy,  and  both 
classes  were  much  broken  in  fortune,  and  possibly  discouraged,  by  the  marching 
and  counter-marching  of  the  troops.  Their  farms  were  plundered  by  both 
armies ;  and  they  often  came  near  starvation  themselves.  In  Knoxville  the 
majorities  are  usually  Republican,  although  the  struggle  is  sometimes  very  close. 
In  Chattanooga  Republican  municipal  rule  is  also  purchased  at  the  expense  of  a 
careful  fight.  In  the  mountain  counties  people  are  not  very  much  engrossed  with 
general  politics ;  their  local  affairs  alone  occupy  their  attention.  At  the  period  of 
my  visit  the  school  law  allowed  each  county  to  decide  for  itself  as  to  taxation  for 
the  support  of  free  schools,  and  thus  far  no  very  marked  progress  has  been  made 
in  the  State.  Tennessee  admits  the  disagreeable  fact  that  she  ranks  third  in  illit- 
eracy in  the  Union,  but  her  population  dees  not  seem  as  yet  to  feel  the  situation 
very  keenly.  Knoxville  has  good  schools,  with  about  1,400  scholars  as  an  aver- 
age attendance ;  it  also  supports  four  colored  schools.  Chattanooga's  regular 
attendance  is  about  1,000,  and  it  also  has  two  large  colored  schools.  On  the 
whole,  Eastern  Tennessee  seems  to  make  as  much  progress  in  education  as  other 
sections  of  the  State  in  proportion  to  its  population.  Some  of  its  counties  have 
totally  refused  to  have  any  public  schools ;  while  others  have  levied  small  taxes 
for  supporting  winter  sessions.  The  Peabody  fund  has  been  very  active  in  East 
Tennessee,  and  it  is  largely  due  to  its  influential  distribution  that  a  feeling  in 
favor  of  schools  is  gradually  taking  root  among  the  masses.  The  founding  of 
two  or  three  Normal  schools  in  the  State  is  a  prime  necessity.  In  a  common- 
wealth which  has  thus  far  succeeded  in  getting  only  one-fifth  of  its  400,000  pupil- 


548 


COLLEGES AGRICULTURE. 


children  into  schools,  the  education  of  capable  teachers  is  certainly  of  first 
importance. 

Knoxville  is  the  seat  of  the  East  Tennessee  University,  and  the  State  Asylum 
for  deaf  and  dumb  persons.  The  University  has  latterly  received  a  large  share 
of  the  $200,000  appropriated  as  the  "Agricultural  Fund  "  of  the  State,  and  will 
serve  as  the  Agricultural  College.  It  now  has  some  300  students.  The  Method- 
ist Episcopal  Church  contemplates  founding  a  college  at  Knoxville ;  and  there, 
or  at  Chattanooga,  the  people  of  one  of  the  grandest  mineral  regions  on  this 
continent  should  not  fail  to  establish  a  school  of  mines. 

The  peaks  of  the  Cumberland,  the  Clinch  and  the  Smoky,  furnish  Knoxville 
with  many  beautiful  mountain  views ;   and  the  eye  dwells  with  delight  on  the 


The  East  Tennessee 
University — Knoxville. 


route  from  Chattanooga  even  to 
Greenville,  upon  the  fields  so 
beautifully  cultivated,  on  the 
noble  orchards,  and  the  forests 
of  mammoth  corn  stalks.  The 
soil  in  this  elevated  valley  is 
generally  rich,  second  only  to  that  of  the  Western  prairies;  the  summers  are 
long,  but  never  excessively  hot;  there  is  only  a  light  snow-fall  in  winter;  in 
the  valleys  the  water  is  limestone ;  on  the  hills  freestone  and  chalybeate.  On 
the  table-lands  grow  rye,  oats,  and  all  vegetables;  in  the  valleys  wheat  and  corn 
attain  extraordinary  size.  Apples,  pears,  peaches  and  wild  grapes  are  cultivated 
in  profusion,  and  the  grazing- lands  are  no  whit  poorer  than  those  of  the  North 
Carolina  mountain  region,  which  are  so  perfect  and  inexpensive.  Land  ranges 
in  value  from  $5  to  $35  per  acre. 

Through  this  fruitful  country,  and  almost  on  the  line  of  the  railroad  of  to-day, 
ran  the  "  great  Indian  war-path  "  eighty  years  ago.     When  one  reflects  upon  the 


THE   DUCKTOWN   COPPER  REGION.  549 

vast  territory  cleared,  settled,  and  dominated  within  three  generations,  by  the 
Tennessean,  he  cannot  refrain  from  admiration,  nor  will  he  refuse  to  believe  in 
the  greatest  possibilities  in  the  future. 

The  Ducktown  copper  region  in  Eastern  Tennessee,  near  the  North  Carolina 
line,  is  worth  a  visit  from  all  interested  in  the  State's  development.  It  is  the  only 
locality  in  the  commonwealth  yielding  copper  ore  in  any  considerable  quantity. 
Although  traces  of  the  metal  are  to  be  met  with  in  the  Unaka  mountains,  they 
•do  not  indicate  veins  of  any  importance.  Ducktown  is  a  mountain  basin  that 
belongs  physically  to  Georgia  and  North  Carolina.  In  the  vicinity  of  the  mines, 
2,000  feet  above  sea-level,  deep  ravines  alternate  with  sharp  ridges,  at  whose  base 
the  Ocoee  river  worms  its  way  toward  the  main  Unaka  range — when  it  becomes 
a  torrent,  roaring  over  huge  rocks  in  its  passage  through  the  narrows.  As  early 
as  1836,  the  attention  of  geologists  was  drawn  to  the  mineral  deposits  near  the 
junction  of  the  Ocoee  and  the  Hiawassee  rivers,  and  indications  of  copper  were 
finally  discovered  by  men  who  were  searching  for  gold. 

One  of  these  men,  while  washing  in  the  Hiawassee  for  gold,  found  great 
numbers  of  crystals  of  red  copper  ore.  Soon  after,  the  black  oxide,  which  has 
thus  far  been  the  most  important  ore  of  the  mines,  was  found  ;  but  it  was  not 
until  1850  that  mining  was  begun  in  earnest.  The  gentlemen  who  opened 
the  mines  found  themselves  surrounded  by  a  rough  population,  who  took  no 
interest  whatever  in  any  improvements;  and  on  one  occasion,  when  they  had 
called  a  meeting  of  the  township,  and  explained  to  the  assembled  citizens  that 
civilization  and  wealth  would  follow  upon  the  opening  of  the  mines,  one  of  the 
assembly  arose  and  said  that  most  of  those  present  had  come  to  the  mountains 
to  get  away  from  civilization,  and  if  it  followed  them  too  closely,  they  would 
migrate  again ! 

This  was  discouraging;  but  the  owners  of  the  mines  opened  day  and  Sabbath 
schools,  and  built  roads  over  the  hitherto  almost  impassable  mountains;  meantime 
sinking  shafts  and  employing  the  few  whom  they  could  prevail  upon  to  under- 
take regular  labor.  Between  185 1  and  the  close  of  1855  a  number  of  mines 
were  opened  and  worked  successfully  in  this  region,  and  during  that  time  eight 
of  them  produced  and  shipped  14,291  tons,  worth  more  than  a  million  of  dollars. 
A  few  years  later  a  consolidated  company,  called  "  The  Union,"  was  formed 
from  a  number  of  the  most  prosperous  organizations,  and  its  works  now  extend 
over  2,500  acres.  Refineries  were  constructed,  and  although  the  company  was 
prevented  from  working  much  of  the  time  during  the  war,  it  has  been  very  pros- 
perous. The  refining  works  have  yielded  nearly  1,500,000  pounds  of  refined 
copper  since  the  war.  In  most  of  the  Ducktown  mines  the  operations  have  been 
confined  to  the  zones  of  black  and  red  copper  ore,  below  which  lie  zones  of  iron 
and  copper  pyrites.  The  smelting  works  of  the  Union  Consolidated  Company 
are  very  extensive. 

Lead  and  zinc  are  pretty  liberally  scattered  through  Eastern  Tennessee,  and 
in  Bradley  and  Monroe  counties  lead  mines  have  been  opened.  At  Mossy  Creek, 
in  Jefferson  county,  and  in  the  mountains  beyond,  there  are  numerous  irregular 
veins  of  zinc  ore.      The  gold  found  in  the  eastern  portion  of  the  State  has  been 


55o 


COAL      MINES THE      SIEGE      OF      KNOXVILLE. 


At  the  JEuia.  Coal  Mines. 


insignificant  in  quantity,  although,  in  183 1,  there  was  a  genuine  gold  fever  con- 
cerning the  discoveries  along  the  Hiawassee. 

The  most  important  coal  mining  establishments  in  the  State  are  the  .-Etna 
mines,   in   Marion  county,  and  the   Sewanee  Company's  mines,   which    extend 

several  miles  underground,  not 
far  from  the  location  of  the  "Uni- 
versity of  the  South."  Some  of 
the  veins  at  these  latter  mines  are 
seven  feet  thick. 

The  coal  in  these  mountains 
can  be  mined  for  three  cents  per 
bushel,  and  the  freights  for  coal 
on  all  the  roads  south  of  Nash- 
ville are  low.  All  the  Tennessee 
coals  are  bituminous ;  but  as  such 
they  present  numerous  varieties. 

One  of  the  sources  of  future 
wealth  for  Eastern  Tennessee  con- 
sists in  its  immense  stores  of  va- 
riegated marble,  the  veins  of 
which  run  through  ten  or  twelve 
counties  in  that  section.  Besides  the  finer  marbles,  there  are,  in  the  extreme 
eastern  counties,  black  or  dark-blue  limestones,  which,  when  polished,  would 
make  elegant  marble  slabs.  There  is  marble  enough  in  this  section  to  build 
all  the  public  buildings  of  the"  United  States  for  the  next  five  centuries. 

The  siege  of  Knoxville,  in  1863,  is  called  to  memory,  but  faintly,  by  the 
earthworks  scattered  about  the  town,  and  now  nearly  obliterated ;  but  it  was 
one  of  the  most  desperate  struggles  of  the  whole  war.  Longstreet  and  his  men, 
fresh  from  their  triumphs  at  Chickamauga,  fell  upon  Burnside's  little  force  in  the 
mountain  city  with  savage  eagerness,  but  were  hurled  back  into  the  jaws  of 
death.  They  charged  toward  the  ditches  only  to  be  pitched  headlong  over  the 
wires  strung  to  trip  them,  and  to  be  massacred.  But  the  living  charged  over 
the  dead  who  filled  the  ditches,  and  twice  had  planted  their  flag  or  leaped  upon 
the  fortifications  before  they  were  finally  swept  away.  Pools  of  blood  six  inches 
deep  were  found  in  the  bottom  of  the  trenches  when  the  assault  was  made  on 
the  morning  after  the  repulse  of  November  29th,  and  hundreds  of  corpses  were 
hastily  buried  in  heaps.  On  the  5th  of  December  following,  the  little  army  of 
the  Ohio,  which  was  literally  at  the  point  of  starvation,  was  at  liberty  once 
more.     The  siege  was  raised. 

The  magnitude  of  the  mineral  resources  in  this  section  perhaps  affords  the 
strongest  argument  in  favor  of  the  immediate  removal  of  the  obstructions  in  the 
Tennessee  river ;  but  the  arguments  are  really  legion.  This  noble  stream,  sixth 
in  magnitude  in  the  United  States,  intersecting  ten  rich  commonwealths — in 
connection  with  the  Ohio,  draining  the  gigantic  coal-areas  of  Tennessee  and 
Alabama — never  bearing  upon  its  current,  from  its  sources  to  its  mouth,  winter 


SOIL     OF     THE     TENNESSEE      PLATEAU, 


551 


or  summer,  a  particle  of  ice,  and  having  half-a-dozen  tributaries  which  could  be 
rendered  navigable  by  slack-water  improvement,  should  be  made  one  of  the 
main  commercial  arteries  of  the  South.  With  the  necessary  improvements, 
navigation  could  be  rendered  practicable  for  thirteen  hundred  miles  above 
Muscle  Shoals  in  Alabama.  Only  steamers  of  the  lightest  draught  now  succeed 
in  running  to  Knoxville  and  beyond  during  six  or  nine  months  of  each  year. 

The  soil  of  the  great  Tennessee  plateau,  the  Cumberland  table-land,  is  no  less 
remarkable  than  the  climate  of  that  favored  region.  For  the  production  of  fruit, 
and  for  the  raising  of  sheep  and  cattle,  the  immigrant  will  find  it  most  admirably 
suited.  Extending  across  the  State  from  north  to  south,  the  plateau  is  at 
least  forty  miles  wide  from  east  to  west,  and  can  furnish  homes  for  thousands  of 
farmers,  who  need  but  little  capital. 


I 


'Down  in  a  Coal  Mine." 


LXI. 


A     VISIT     TO     LYNCHBURG     IN     VIRGINIA. 


c£rTpIME  to  get  up,  boss!" 

X      I  hastily  adjusted   my  garments,  and  hurried  from  the  sleeping-car  of 
the  Richmond    train  on    to    the  Gordonsville    platform,    where  I  was  speedily 


The  old  Market  at  Lynchburg.     [Page  554.] 


lost  in  a  whirlpool  of   English    and  Scotch  immigrants,   surrounded    by  their 
numerous  wives  and   children;   of    negro  touters,   shouting,   "Dis  way,  boss, — 


THE  NEGRO  S  SENSE  OF  TITLES. 


553 


don'  ye  trust  dat  ar  nigger,  he  don  tole  ye  wrong  'bout  de  hotel, — take  yer  bag, 
sar  ?  " — of  stout  colored  damsels,  hastening  to  and  fro  with  platters  of  cold  and 
antiquated, provisions,  and  blue-looking  eggs;  of  farmers  coming  from  markets, 
and  of  through  passengers  shivering  in  the  cool  night  air. 

"  Now,  boss,  dar  's  de  Orange  train  !  " 

You  must  know  that  in  the  South  the  African  is  wont  to  designate  strangers 
to  whom  he  is  indifferent  by  the  euphonious  title  of  "boss."  It  is,  perhaps,  a 
kind  of  compromise  with  his  inclination  to  still  cling  to  the  old  word  "  mas'r," 
and,  at  the  same  time,  embodies  as  much  respect  as  he  cares  to  bestow  on  the 
"  casual "  whom  he  is  called  to  serve.      When  familiar  with  your  face,  he  will  call 


The  James  River,  at  Lynchburg,  Virginia. 


you  "captain,"  if  you  are  young;  "major,"  if  you  are  middle-aged,  and 
"general"  or  "judge,"  if  you  ar_e  advanced  in  years.  He  has  even  been  known 
to  heap  these  titles  upon  strangers  under  the  genial  influence  of  the  respect- 
provoking  twenty-five  cents.  But  at  one  o'clock  in  the  morning,  in  hurrying 
you  from  one  sleeping-car  to  another,  it  would  take  the  potent  influence  of  a 
brand-new  dollar  bill  to  wring  from  him  any  salutation  save  the  accustomed 
"boss." 

The  train  from  Washington  came  crawling  along  the  Orange  road,  and 
received  me,  while  the  one  I  had  just  left  rushed  forward  into  the  mountains, 
and  by  the  side  of  the  deep  ravines  of  Western  Virginia,  toward  the  Ohio  river. 


554  THE     IMMIGRANTS  — A     PICTURESQUE     TOWN. 

Among  the  immigrants  there  were  many  Englishmen  of  education  and  refine- 
ment, country  gentlemen's  sons  who  had  made  up  their  minds  to  try  farming  in 
the  new  country,  or  to  purchase  coal  or  iron  tracts  for  speculation.  Even  the 
least  cultured  and  rudest  of  these  people  wore  the  look  of  health  and  pros- 
perity.    Their  advent  was  an  encouraging  symptom. 

But  in  the  car  where  the  colored  people  were  seated  there  were  a  good  many 
discouraging  signs.  Was  it  possible  to  mould  these  slouching  and  ragged  fellows, 
who  talked  so  rudely,  whose  gestures  were  so  uncouth,  and  on  whose  features 
had  been  stamped  the  seal  of  ignorance,  into  as  useful  and  trustworthy  citizens 
as  these  newly- arrived  Britons,  with  their  hardy  cleanliness  and  bluff  ambition, 
were  likely  to  become  ?  And  if  not,  what  would  be  the  future  condition  of  the 
lately  liberated  slave  ?  Was  he  prospering,  and  hastening  forward  to  the  con- 
summation of  the  independent  manhood  promised  him  ?  These  questions,  idly 
drifting  in  my  sleepy  mind  without  expecting  answers,  served  to  amuse  and 
keep  awake  a  tired  body  until  the  train  trembled  to  a  stand-still  at  the  foot  of 
the  steep  hill  along  whose  sides  Lynchburg  lies. 

At  midday  I  strolled  out  to  survey  the  town.  The  September  sun  poured 
terrible  heat  upon  the  broad  James  river,  which,  opposite  the  network  of  tracks 
at  the  depot,  flowed  placidly  at  the  base  of  an  immense  cliff,  from  whose  stony 
sides  quarrymen  were  blasting  and  chiseling  blocks  for  building  purposes.  A 
few  rafts  and  flat-boats,  steered  by  barearmed  and  bareheaded  negroes,  drifted 
lazily  on  the  stream.  A  long  covered  bridge  spanned  the  water,  and  a  glance 
through  its  little  windows  showed  quaint  mills  and  houses  upon  the  banks  ;  high 
bluffs,  crowned  with  humble  cabins,  were  rendered  accessible  by  precipitous 
paths  and  flights  of  stone  steps ;  and,  in  the  distance,  were  blue  outlines  of 
mountains,  with  little  cloud-wreaths  around  them. 

Returning  from  the  bridge  toward  the  town  I  came  to  a  wide  street,  stretching 
straight  up  the  hill.  On  either  side  were  stone  pavements,  crowded  with  negroes; 
colored  children  gamboled  on  the  flags ;  colored  mammas  smoked  pipes  in  the 
doorways  of  shops,  where  colored  fathers  sold  apples,  beer,  and  whiskey ;  col- 
ored damsels,  with  baskets  of  clean  linen  in  their  stout  arms,  joked  with  colored 
boatmen  from  the  canal ;  colored  draymen  cursed  and  pounded  their  mules ; 
and  colored  laborers  on  the  streets  enveloped  one  in  a  cloud  of  suffocating 
dust  as  he  hastened  by.  Toward  the  water  sloped  other  streets  lined  with  roomy 
tobacco  warehouses ;  half-way  up  the  hill  a  broad  and  well-built  business  avenue 
crossed  at  right  angles,  and  there,  at  last,  one  saw  white  people,  and  the  ordinary 
sights  of  a  city. 

Finally  I  came  into  an  open  air  market,  picturesque  as  any  in  Italy  or  Spain. 
On  the  curbing  of  the  sidewalk,  and  even  on  the  stones  in  the  middle  of  the 
square,  dozens  of  negro  women  were  seated  before  baskets  containing  vegetables, 
or  various  goods  of  trivial  description.  One  venerable  matron,  weighing  perhaps 
200  pounds,  had  her  profuse  chignon  overtopped  by  a  dilapidated  beaver,  and 
was  smoking  a  clay  pipe.  Many  young  women  were  cleanly  and  nicely  dressed, 
and  had  folded  back  the  huge  flaps  of  their  starched  sun-bonnets,  so  that  they 
seemed  to  imitate  the  head-dresses  of  the  Italian  maidens  at  Sorrento.      Hosts 


"OLD     LYNCHBURG." 


555 


of  colored  buyers,  market-baskets  in  hand,  hovered  from  one  seller  to  another, 
talking  in  high-pitched  voices,  and  in  a  dialect  which  Northern  ears  found  diffi- 
cult to  understand.  Leaving  the  market,  and  yet  ascending,  I  came  to  another 
broad  street  lined  with  comfortable  dwellings,  and  looking  up  saw,  still  far  above 
me,  the  "  Court-House"  perched  on  the  topmost  point. 

Lynchburg  lies  among  the  mountains,  on  the  south  bank  of  the  James 
river,  nearly  in  the  centre  of  the  Piedmont  district  of  Virginia,  and  not  far  from 
the  base  of  the  Blue  Ridge.  The  Virginians  of  all  sections  speak  affectionately 
of  it  as  "Old  Lynchburg."  It  was  once  the  wealthiest  city  in  the  United  States, 
in  proportion  to  its  population,  and  one  of  the  most  remarkable  tobacco  marts  in 
the  world.  Colossal  fortunes  were  amassed  and  enjoyed  there,  in  the  days  when 
internal  revenue  was  not,  and  slave  labor  tilled  the  fields.  Then  the  products  of 
the  Virginia  and  North  Carolina  plantations  filled  its  warehouses  and  manufac- 


A  Side  Street  in  Lynchburg,  Virginia. 

tories  to  bursting,  and  all  Europe  came  to  buy.  An  Irish  emigrant  gave  his 
name,  in  1786,  to  the  town;  and  the  famous  term  "Lynch  law,"  now  so  uni- 
versal, sprang  from  the  summary  manner  in  which  this  hot-headed  Hibernian^- 
a  colonel  in  the  Revolutionary  army — treated  such  tories  as  were  caught  by  him. 
During  the  late  war  the  town  did  not  fall  into  Federal  hands.  The  tide  of  war 
flowed  all  around  it,  but  never  mounted  to  the  reddish  hills  where  it  had 
safely  perched. 

Lynchburg's  great  natural  advantages  of  situation  will,  in  a  few  years,  increase 

it  from  a  city  of   12,000  population  to  a  huge  overcrowded  railway  centre.      It 

possesses  superb  and  abundant  water  power.     Coal  is  to  be  had  in  the  immediate 

neighborhood  cheaper  than  in  most  of  the  other  cities  in  the  Atlantic  States. 

36 


556  THE     LOCATION     AND     TRADE     OF     LYNCHBURG. 

Two  important  railway  lines  intersect  at  Lynchburg,  the  Atlantic,  Mississippi  and 
Ohio,  now  connecting  Norfolk  on  the  Atlantic  with  Memphis  on  the  Mississippi, 
and  destined  also  to  connect  Norfolk  with  Louisville  on  the  Ohio ;  and  the.  Wash- 
ington City,  Virginia  Midland  and  Great  Southern  road  which  connects  from 
Alexandria,  in  North-eastern  Virginia,  with  Danville  in  the  southern  part  of  the 
State,  and  forms  a  link  in  the  great  Air  Line  between  the  cities  on  the  Gulf  and 
New,  York.  The  latter  road  opens  to  Lynchburg  the  whole  Piedmont  district,  so 
rich  in  grains,  grasses,  fruits,  tobacco,  minerals  and  timber.  The  James  river 
and  Kanawha  canal  now  extends  from  tide-water  at  Richmond,  about  200  miles 
through  the  centre  of  the  State,  to  a  point  near  the  base  of  the  Alleghanies,  but 
if  carried  to  the  Ohio,  by  means  of  liberal  improvements  in  the  Kanawha  river, 
would  revolutionize  American  internal  commerce.  This  canal  winds  in  pleasant 
curves  between  green  banks  through  the  mountains  and  at  the  base  of  the 
Lynchburg  hills ;  and  the  horn  of  the  boatmen  is  heard,  making  cheery  melody 
at  sunset.  It  was  a  grand  mistake  to  locate  the  canal  on  the  river-level.  Peo- 
ple have  grown  somewhat  wiser  since  1841,  when  the  route  was  opened  to 
navigation,  and  now  regret  that  they  did  not  place  it  high  enough  to  secure 
the  water  power.  The  Chesapeake  and  Ohio  rail  route  runs  a  little  to  the 
north  of  Lynchburg. 

Finding  the  old  town  standing  so  "  amid  the  fertile  lands,"  with  such  excel- 
lent chances  for  growth,  the  new-comer  feels,  at  first,  like  reproaching  its 
inhabitants,  despite  the  shock  which  they  received  in  the  war,  for  want  of  enter- 
prise. But  a  careful  examination  shows  that  Lynchburg  boasts  a  considerable 
activity.  It  has  thirty-five  tobacco  factories,  employing  great  numbers  of 
negroes,  men,  women,  and  children.  These  negroes  earn  good  wages,  work 
faithfully,  and  turn  out  vast  quantities  of  the  black,  ugly  compound  known  as 
"  plug,"  which  has  enslaved  so  many  thousands,  and  promoted  such  a  sublime 
disregard  for  the  proprieties  in  the  matter  of  expectoration.  The  appended 
note  will  give  an  idea  of  the  trade  of  the  tobacco  district  of  which  Lynchburg 
is  the  centre.*  In  the  manufactories  the  negro  is  the  same  cheery,  capricious 
being  that  one  finds  him  in  the  cotton  or  sugar-cane  fields ;  he  sings  quaintly 
over  his  toil,  and  seems  entirely  devoid  of  the  sullen  ambition  which  many  of  our 
Northern  factory  laborers  exhibit.  The  men  and  women  working  around  the 
tables  in  the  basements  of  the  Lynchburg  tobacco  establishments  croon  eccentric 
hymns  in  concert  all  day  long;   and    their  little  children,  laboring  before  they 

*^A.  comparative  statement  of  the  tax  paid  on  manufactured  tobacco  shipped  from  the  Fifth 
District  of  Virginia,  in  the  fiscal  years  of  1871-72  and  1872-73,  show  that  during  the  first  period 
the  amount  manufactured  was  5,351,894  pounds,  on  which  was  paid  a  tax  of  $1,501,526;  and  for 
the  latter  period  10,774,611  pounds,  on  which  the  taxation  amounted  to  $2,154,922.20.  The 
total  weight  of  tobacco,  in  hogsheads,  in  boxes,  and  "  loose,"  inspected  at  Lynchburg  from  Octo- 
ber 1,  1870,  to  October  1,  1871,  was  17,425,439  pounds,  of  which  1 1,629,239  pounds  were  brought 
in  loose  or  unpacked;  and  for  the  same  period  in  1871-72  the  total  weight  was  14,323,708 
pounds,  more  than  10,000,000  pounds  of  which  quantity  was  brought  in  unpacked.  Campbell, 
Bedford,  Pittsylvania,  Halifax,  Charlotte,  Appomattox,  Amherst,  Nelson,  Rockbridge,  Botetourt, 
Roanoke,  Franklin,  Montgomery,  Giles,  Washington,  Floyd,  and  Mercer  counties  furnish  most 
of  the  tobacco  received  at  Lynchburg. 


THE      LACK      OF      CHANGE      IN      VIRGINIA. 


557 


are  hardly  large  enough  to  go  alone,  join  in  the  refrains.  Tobacco  is  the 
main  article  of  Lynchburg  trade.  Buyers  from  all  parts  of  the  Union  crowd 
the  streets ;  the  warehouses  are  daily  visited  by  throngs.  Other  manufactures 
are  slowly  creeping  in,  and  the  venerable  town  will  probably  yet  do  its  share 
in  developing  the  iron  so  profusely  scattered  through  South-western  Virginia. 
Lynchburg  stands  in  the  centre  of  a  region  richly  supplied  with  educational 
institutions.  Within  a  radius  of  sixty  miles  Roanoke  and  Hampden-Sidney 
Colleges,  the  Virginia  Military  Institute,  the  University  of  Virginia,  and  the 
Washington  -  Lee  University,  are  all  situated.  Its  own  public  and  private 
schools  are  numerous  and  of  excellent  character.  The  Virginian  and  the 
other  Lynchburg  newspapers  hold  high  rank  among  the  journals  of  the  State. 


Scene  in  a  Lynchburg  Tobacco  Factory. 

The  annual  fairs  of  the  Agricultural  and  Mechanical  Society  bring  together 
hundreds  of  farmers  from  all  parts  of  the  commonwealth. 

Down  the  steep  hills" every  day  come  the  country  wagons  (often  with  a  bull, 
a  mule,  and  an  old  mare  harnessed  together  as  the  team),  loaded  with  the  dark 
sheaves  of  tobacco  ;  and  the  groups  of  men  standing  about  the  parks  and  public 
places  are  almost  certain  to  be  discussing  the  favorite  staple. 

Something  of  the  old  Scotch  and  English  manners  are  still  perceptible  among 
the  people  in  this  part  of  Virginia ;  and  there  are  bits  of  dialect  and  phrase 
which  show  how  little  the  communities  have  been  affected  during  the  last  century 
by  the  influences  which  have  so  transformed  the  populations  of  other  sections 
of  America.  While  England  has  gone  on  from  change  to  change,  and  has  even 
been  capable  of  complete  revolution  in  certain  matters,  Virginia  has  altered  but 
little.      Until  now  immigration  has  had  no  inducements  to  come  and  unlock  the 


558 


SOUTH-WESTERN     VIRGINIA. 


"Down  the  steep  hills  every  day  come  the  country  wagons."      [Page  557.] 


treasure-house  of  the  grand  mountains  of  the  South-west,  and  so  the  people 
have  lived  under  pretty  much  the  same  laws  and  customs  that  prevailed  in 
England  two  centuries  ago.  Yet  the  absence  of  the  rushing,  turbulent  current  of 
immigration   has  had  its  compensating  advantages  in    allowing  the  growth  of 

families  in  which  the 
hereditary  love  of  culture 
and  refinement,  and  the 
strictest  attention  to  those 
graces  and  courtesies 
which  always  distinguish 
a  pure  and  dignified  soci- 
ety, are  preeminently 
conspicuous. 

South-western  Vir- 
ginia is  a  region  which 
will  in  time  be  overrun 
by  tourists  and  land  spec- 
ulators. The  massive 
ramparts  of  the  Allegha- 
nies  are  pierced  here  and 
there  by  cuts  through 
which  crawls  the  line  of 
the  Atlantic,  Mississippi  and  Ohio  railroad ;  and  towns  are  springing  up  with 
almost  Western  rapidity.  Stores  of  coal  and  iron  are  daily  brought  to  light; 
and  the  farmer  of  the  old  regime  stares  with  wonder,  not  wholly  unmixed  with 
jealousy,  at  the  smart  new-comers  who  are  agitating  the  subject  of  branch  rail- 
roads, and  searching  into  the  very  entrails  of  the  hills. 

The  sea-board  link  of  the  Atlantic,  Mississippi  and  Ohio  railroad  was  orig- 
inally known  as  the  Norfolk  and  Petersburg  road,  and  was  completed  in  1858, 
under  the  direction  of  William  Mahone,  an  engineer  of  decided  talent  At  the 
close  of  the  war  this  line,  as  well  as  the  Southside,  running  from  Petersburg  to 
Lynchburg,  and  the  Virginia  and  Tennessee  road,  extending  from  Lynchburg 
to  Bristol,  were  in  a  lamentable  condition,  having  been  completely  worn  down 
by  the  heavy  traffic  and  constant  wear  and  tear  during  the  great  civil  struggle. 
A  measure  for  the  consolidation  of  these  roads,  and  their  rebuilding  and 
thorough  equipment  as  a  grand  inter-State  highway,  was  brought  before  the 
Virginia  Legislature,  and  became  the  subject  of  much  discussion.  The  engineer, 
Mahone,  had  been  for  many  years  prominent  in  the  railway  affairs  of  the  com- 
monwealth, and  was  now  the  foremost  advocate  of  the  unification  measure. 
He  had  also  been  a  brilliant  fighter  on  the  Confederate  side,  had  gone 
through  the  struggle  to  the  bitter  end,  standing  by  Lee  at  Appomattox, 
and,  as  in  the  battle  years  he  had  been  impetuous,  persistent,  and  unsparing 
of  self,  so  now,  in  the  pursuit  of  this  great  scheme  for  a  route  from  Norfolk 
to  the  Ohio  and  the  Mississippi  rivers,  he  was  characterized  by  the  same 
qualities. 


THE      ATLANTIC,      MISSISSIPPI      AND      OHIO      RAILROAD.  55^ 

Ever  since  George  Washington  plainly  pointed  out  the  advantages  of  a  route 
between  the  Atlantic  coast  and  the  Ohio  river,  the  attention  of  Virginian  states- 
manship has  been  directed  to  the  subject ;  but  it  remained  for  General  Mahone, 
with  his  clear  logic  and  irresistible  array  of  facts,  to  exercise  the  influence  which 
finally  brought  about  the  needed  legislation,  and  on  the  12th  of  November, 
1870,  resulted  in  the  organization  of  the  present  line,  merging  together  the 
Norfolk  and  Petersburg,  the  "  Southside,"  the  Virginia  and  Tennessee,  and  the 
Virginia  and  Kentucky  railroads. 

By  this  there  were  placed  under  one  management  five  hundred  miles  of  rail- 
road lying  upon  the  best  and  shortest  location  afforded  by  the  continent  between 
the  centres  of  Western  trade  and  the  finest  harbors  on  the  Atlantic  sea-board. 
This  continuous  line,  running  east  and  west  between  the  extreme  western  border 
of  the  State  and  the  sea-board,  will  bestow  its  trade  within,  and  confer  its  benefits 
upon,  towns  and  cities  in  the  limits  of  Virginia ;  and  by  building  up  large  centres, 
will  gradually  reduce  the  rate  of  taxation  levied  upon  the  agricultural  population. 
In  its  completed  form  it  will  be,  in  the  words  of  a  distinguished  Virginian,  "a 
line  which  spans  one-half  the  continent  at  its  narrowest  breadth,  which  begins  at 
that  point  of  the  very  sea-board  nearest  the  western  trade  centre,  and  reaches  out 
not  only  to  the  proper  west  in  its  middle,  but  also  to  the  north-west  and  the 
south-west  " — a  line,  in  fact,  which  will  make  the  Atlantic  via  Norfolk  351  miles 
nearer  Louisville,  260  miles  nearer  Cincinnati,  and  400  miles  nearer  Cairo,  than 
via  New  York  city.  Traversing  the  most  prosperous  and  fertile  portion  of  Vir- 
ginia, it  diverges  at  Bristol,  to  penetrate,  by  means  of  its  present  and  future  con- 
nections, the  entire  South  and  South-west,  and  via  Cumberland  Gap,  the  State  of 
Kentucky  and  the  huge  North-west.  The  three  railroads  now  composing  this 
main  line  were  placed  under  the  management  of  General  Mahone  as  early  as 
1869  (he  having  been  successively  chosen  president  of  each  one),  but  they  con- 
tinued for  some  time  afterward  to  act  under  their  separate  charters.* 

*  In  1866-67,  before  the  three  lines  above-mentioned  were  placed  under  one  general  man- 
agement, the  number  of  tons  transported  upon  them  was  145,000.  During  the  year  ending 
September  30,  1872,  the  amount  transported  by  the  consolidated  line,  was  205,000  tons.  In 
1866-67,  the  average  charge  per  ton  per  mile  was  five  and  a-quarter  cents;  in  1871-72  it  was 
two  and  three-fourth  cents.  This  great  reduction  of  rate  was  followed  by  an  increase  of  revenue 
from  $1,000,000,  in  1866-67,  to  $1,969,000  in  1871-72,  and  for  1872-73,  to  over  $2,000,000. 
The  Norfolk  and  Petersburg  road  was  in  active  operation  as  an  independent  road  in  i860.  Its 
entire  revenue  for  that  fiscal  year  was  $96,621.74.  That  same  division  of  the  consolidated  road 
earned  for  the  year  ending  September  30,  1872,  $376,531.  The  cotton  transported  over  this 
route  all  goes  to  Norfolk,  except  that  taken  by  the  Petersburg  and  Richmond  mills,  which  yearly 
increases  in  amount.  The  number  of  bales  carried  in  1871-72  was  130,000;  in  1872-73,  177,000, 
coming  mainly  from  Memphis,  Selma,  Nashville,  Huntsville  and  Dalton.  Some  of  the  other, 
and  no  less  important,  fruits  of  the  consolidation  measure  are  seen  in  the  following  statistics :  In 
1866-67  the  quantity  of  minerals  transported  was  but  13,000  tons;  in  1871-72  it  was  31,000 
tons.  In  1866-67,  the  weight  of  live  stock  moved  was  3,000  tons;  in  1871-72  it  was  15,000. 
The  contrast  in  the  amount  of  wheat  is  still  more  striking:  it  has  increased  from  17,000 
bushels  in  1866-67,  to  263,000  bushels  in  1871-72.  In  this  same  latter  year  there  were  deliv- 
ered to  Virginia  cities  88,000  tons  of  agricultural  and  mineral  products,  and  47,000  tons  were 
sent  North. 


5<5o 


SIGHTS      IN      LYNCHBURG. 


The  traveler  who  hastens  through  Lynchburg,  repelled  by  the  uncouth  and 
prosaic  surroundings  of  the  railway  station,  will  lose  real  pleasure.  A  residence 
of  a  few  days  in  the  old  town  will  show  him  much  that  is  novel  and  interesting. 
He  may  wander  along  the  beautiful  banks  of  the  James  below  Lynchburg; 
by  the  canal  whereon  the  gayly-painted  boats  slip  merrily  to  their  destination ; 
or  he  may  climb  the  steep  hills  behind  the  town,  and  get  a  glimpse  of  the 
winding  stream  which  looks  like  a  silver  thread  among  the  blue  mountains. 
At  noontide  he  may  hear  the  mellow  notes  of  the  horn  by  which  buyers  are 
summoned  to  a  tobacco  sale ;  and  at  sunset  he  may  watch  the  curious  groups 
of  negroes  returning  from  their  labors  singing  and  chattering,  or  noisily  dis- 
puting some  momentous  political  issue. 


Summoning  Buyers  to  a  Tobacco  Sale. 


LXII. 


IN     SOUTH-WESTERN     VIRGINIA — THE     PEAKS     OF     OTTER. 
THE     MINERAL      SPRINGS. 


IT  was  in  the  brilliant  early  autumn  that  I  visited  South-western  Virginia. 
Leaving  Lynchburg,  just  at  sunset,  for  the  mountains  beyond,  I  was 
impressed  with  the  beauty  of  the  soft  light  which  gently  rested  upon  the  lovely 
stream,  and  was  gradually  losing  itself  in  the  mysterious  twilight.  '  The  foliage 
was  at  its  completest  still ;  the  gay  loungers  at  the  pretty  little  fashion-resorts 
scattered  through  the  .  mountains  were  giving  their  sprightliest  balls  before 
retiring  to  the  solitude  and  routine  of  their  plantations.  The  tobacco-fields  were 
yet  resplendent  with  green.  The  farmers  were  fallowing  the  lands  on  the  rich 
hill-sides  for  winter  wheat.  Every  day  the  sun  shone  with  inspiring  splendor  on 
the  blue  lines  of  monarch  mountains,  which,  clothed  in  their  beautiful  forests, 
reared  their  crests  against  the  un- 
clouded sky.  I  did  not  wander  along 
the  winding  canal,  in  the  recesses  of 
the  hills,  as  far  as  the  famous  "  Natural 
Bridge,"  but  he  who  wishes  to  inspect 
that  massive  arch,  spanning  the  chasm 
in  which  flows  the  little  stream  called 
Cedar  creek,  can  reach  it  by  a  night's 
journey  along  the  canal,  from  Lynch- 
burg to  the  mouth  of  Cedar  creek, 
within  two  miles  of  the  bridge.  The 
route,  on  a  moonlit  evening,  is  delight- 
ful, as  the  banks  of  the  canal  afford  a 
constant  succession  of  beautiful 
mountain  pictures.  But  we  leave  the 
description  of  the  approach  to  the 
bridge,  and  the  great  monumental 
wonder's  special  characteristics,  to  the 
pen  of  a  native  Virginian : 

"  The  first  view  of  the  bridge  is  ob- 
tained half  a  mile  from  it,  at  a  turn  on 
the  stage -road.  It  is  revealed  with 
the  suddenness  of  an  apparition.  Raised  a  hundred  feet  above  the  highest 
trees  of  the  forest,  and  revealed  against  the  purple  side  of  a  distant  mount- 
ain,   a   whitish -gray   arch   is    seen,    in  the    effect   of  distance   as   perfect   and 


Evening  on  the  James  River — "The  soft  light  which 
gently  rested  upon  the  lovely  stream." 


562 


THE     "NATURAL     BRIDGE"     OF     VIRGINIA. 


clean-cut  an  arch  as  its  Egyptian  inventor  could  have  defined.  The  tops 
of  trees  are  waving  in  the  interval,  the  upper  half  of  which  we  only  see, 
and  the  stupendous  arch  that  spans  the  upper  air  is  relieved  from  the  first 
impression  that  it  is  man's    masonry,  the  work  of  art,  by  the   fifteen  or  twenty 

feet  of  soil  that  it  supports, 
in  which  trees  and  shrub- 
bery are  firmly  imbedded 
— the  verdant  crown  and 
testimony  of  Nature's  great 
work.  And  here  we  are 
divested  of  an  imagination 
which  we  believe  is  popular, 
that  the  bridge  is  merely 
a  huge  slab  of  rock  thrown 
across  a  chasm,  or  some 
such  hasty  and  violent 
arrangement.  It  is  no 
such  thing.  The  arch  and 
whole  interval  are  con- 
tained in  one  solid  rock; 
the  average  width  of  that 
which  makes  the  bridge  is 
eighty  feet,  and  beyond 
this  the  rock  extends  for  a 
hundred  feet  or  so  in 
mural  precipices,  divided 
by    only    a   single    fissure, 

In  the  Gap  of  the  Peaks  of  Otter,  Virginia.  ^    makes    &    natund    pier 

on  the  upper  side  of  the  bridge,  and  up  which  climb  the  hardy  firs,  ascending 
step  by  step  on  the  noble  rock-work  till  they  overshadow  you. 

"This  mighty  rock,  sunk  in  the  earth's  side,  of  which  even  what  appears 
is  stupendous,  is  of  limestone,  covered  to  the  depth  of  from  four  to  six 
feet  with  alluvial  and  clayey  earth.  The  span  of  the  arch  runs  from  forty- 
five  to  sixty  feet  wide,  and  its  height  to  the  under  line  is  one  hundred 
and  ninety-six  feet,  and  to  the  head  two  hundred  and  fifteen  feet.  The 
form  of  the  arch  approaches  the  elliptical;  the  stage -road  which  passes 
over  the  bridge  runs  from  north  to  south,  with  an  acclivity  of  35  degrees, 
and  the  arch  is  carried  over  on  a  diagonal  line,  the  very  line  of  all  others 
most  difficult  for  the  architect  to  realize,  and  that  best  calculated  for  pict- 
uresque effect." 

Promising  myself  a  visit  to  the  Natural  Bridge  in  the  future,  I  made  all 
speed  to  the  other  wonder  of  the  neighborhood — the  keen,  sublime  and 
haughty  "Peaks  of  Otter." 

Tenderly  outlined  against  the  exquisite  pearl  gray  of  the  morning  sky  was  the 
Blue  Ridge,  as  I  looked  at  it  from  the  windows  of  the  little  inn  of  Liberty,  the 


GOING     TO     THE      "PEAKS      OF      OTTER."  563 

shire  town  of  Bedford  county,  the  point  of  departure  for  the  Peaks  of  Otter.  I 
noticed  but  little  life  or  activity  in  the  long  street  on  Liberty  hill;  some  negroes 
were  at  work  in  one  or  two  tobacco  warehouses ;  farmers  were  bustling  in  on 
the  red  country  roads  leading  toward  the  purplish  hill-background ;  and  miles 
away  two  sharp,  yet  symmetrical  peaks,  connected  by  a  gap,  perched  high  up 
on  the  Blue   Ridge  chain,  sprang  into  view. 

There  were  the  mighty  twins  !  Two  splendid  guardians  of  the  sweet  valley 
spread  out  at  their  bases,  they  rose  in  indescribable  grandeur.  Where  they 
take  root  in  the  gradually  ascending  earth,  a  capricious  creek,  the  Otter, 
from  which  they  get  their  name,  eddies  and  bubbles  and  ripples  in  poetic  confu- 
sion through  rich  fields,  and  by  humble  farm-dwellings,  and  granaries  fashioned 
from  the  mountain  trees.  The  northern  and  highest  peak  is  rarely  visited ;  it 
rises  5,307  feet  above  the  level  of  the  sea.  The  other,  more  symmetrical  in 
shape, — something  like  an  enormous  pyramid,  and  capped  by  a  chaotic  mass  of 
rock  reaching  seemingly  into  the  clouds, — we  determined  to  scale. 

The  negro  livery-man  had  promised  us  a  "hack,"  and  consequently  arrived 
with  a  red  spring- wagon,  perched  high  upon  four  clumsy  wheels,  and  drawn  by 
two  unambitious  horses.  The  road,  for  a  mile  or  two  after  leaving  Liberty,  was 
good  ;  then  we  fell  upon  the  ordinary  back-country  route  in  Virginia,  which  is 
simply  abominable.  Square  brick  mansions  with  an  air  of  solid  respectability, 
standing  in  the  middle  of  green  and  well-kept  lawns,  occupied  the  environs  of 
the  town  ;  but  we  gradually  left  them,  and  passing  through  stretches  of  forest, 
along  the  beds  of  dissolute  creeks  which  seemed  determined  not  to  go  in  the 
narrow  way  accorded  them  by  nature,  and  by  fields  rich  in  culture,  and  abound- 
ing in  delicious  foliage,  we  began  to  climb  around  the  mountain  base. 

We  followed  a  vagrant  road  skulking  apparently  away  from  the  sun.  Now 
the  road  huddled  under  oaks,  and  now  scurried  up  a  thinly-wooded  slope ;  now 
toiled  over  masses  of  loose  stones ;  now  coursed  majestically  along  a  plateau 
whence  one  could  see  the  valley  spread  out  like  a  map ;  now  catching  a  glimpse 
of  the  overhanging  peak  toward  which  we  toiled,  and  then,  as  if  frightened  at 
it,  entered  the  wood  forthwith.  The  cabins  by  the  way  wefe  rude ;  rail-fences, 
chin  high,  through  which  white-headed  children  peered  suspiciously,  ran  by  the 
front  doors ;  near  which  the  cow-yards  were  conspicuous.  Log  barns  were 
partially  filled  with  hay,  while  tobacco  hung  from  the  rafters.  Glancing  upward, 
we  could  frequently  see  the  pinnacle  apparently  suspended  in  mid-air.  It 
seemed  remote  from,  and  disconnected  with,  the  hill  up  to  which  we  toiled, 
frowning   upon  us  like  a  giant  spectre. 

At  last,  reaching  the  gap,  more  than  three  thousand  feet  above  sea-level,  we 
saw  before  us  a  pyramid  of  rough  soil  thickly  sown  with  trees,  and  dotted  with 
cabins  in  a  few  clearings.  On  the  right,  the  northern  peak  showed  its  wooded 
sides,  where  the  bear  still  wanders  undisturbed ;  and  a  little  in  front  of  us 
stood  the  primitive  hotel  surrounded  by  flourishing  orchards.  The  vine  grows 
with  surprising  luxuriance  along  these  mountains,  the  dry  air  and  genial 
warmth  giving  every  encouragement  for  the  largest  experimenting  in  vine- 
yards. 


564 


THE   OUTLOOK   FROM   THE   SUMMIT. 


We  now  began  gradually  to  master  the  ascent,  and  after  half  an  hour 
of  painful  climbing  over  rudest  roads,  and  a  long  scramble  up  an  almost  per- 
pendicular hill-side,  we  came  to  a  point  in  the  forest  where  a  high  rock 
seemed  to  offer  an  impassable  barrier ;  but  around  which  led  a  path  on  a 
narrow  ledge.  We  stumbled  forward,  and  dizzy  with  the  effort,  stood  on  the 
summit. 

Jagged  and  irregular  masses  of  rock  projected  over  a  tremendous  abyss, 
into  which  we  hardly  dared  to  look.  A  strong  wind  blew  steadily  across  the 
height.     We  could  not  help  fancying  that  some  of  the  masses  of  stone,  appa- 

jaesir  rently  so  tightly  sus- 
pended, might  fall  and 
crush  us.  Under  the  great 
dome  of  the  translucent 
sky  we  stood  trembling, 
shut  off  from  the  lower 
world,  and  poised  on  a 
narrow  pinnacle,  from 
which  we  might  at  any 
moment,  by  an  unwary 
step,  be  hurled  down.  An 
old  stone  cabin,  which  had 
once  served  as  the  lodging 
for  such  adventurous  per- 
sons as  desired  to  see  sun- 
rise from  the  peak,  but 
which  had  been  partially 
destroyed  during  the  war, 
was  perched  on  one  of  the 
corners  of  the  mighty  crag ; 
from  it  a  slender  board  was 
laid  to  a  sharp  corner  in 
the  uppermost  cliff,  and  up 
that  we  scrambled.  Then, 
making  our  way  on  to 
the  topmost  stone,  we 
gazed  down  on  the  valley 
of  Virginia.  In  front  of  us,  looking  over  fertile  Bedford  county,  it  seemed  a 
garden ;  from  point  to  point  gleamed  the  spires  and  roofs  of  villages ;  mount- 
ains of  every  imaginable  shape  rose  on  all  sides ;  and  the  forests  at  the  edges 
of  the  gaps  in  the  Blue  Ridge  seemed  delicatest  fringes  of  purple.  We  could 
trace  the  massive  and  curving  ranges  of  the  Alleghanies,  and  the  rudely- 
gullied  sides  of  the  nearest  peaks.  Their  reddish  soil,  showing  up  strongly 
under  the  bright  sun,  produced  a  magical  effect.  Nowhere  were  the  adjacent 
peaks,  however,  so  near  as  to  lessen  the  sublime  illusion  of  seeming  suspen- 
sion in  mid- air,  produced  by  our  climb  to  the  highest  rock  of  the  peak.     The 


The  Summit  of  the  Peak  of  Otter,  Virginia. 


PRICES     OF      LAND-TAXES.  565 

cabins  along  the  roads  below  looked  like  black  dots ;  the  men  at  work  in  the 
fields  like  ants.  From  the  rocky  throne  one  seemed  to  have  the  whole  map 
of  Virginia  spread  out  before  him ;  and  the ,  backbone  of  the  Alleghanies 
appeared  but  as  a  toy  which  one  might  stride  over,  or  displace  at  will. 

Talks  with  the  farmers  and  business  men  along  the  roads  were  full  of  informa- 
tion encouraging  to  would-be  immigrants.  Titles  to  land  are  usually  good,  because 
the  estates  rarely  changed  owners  before  the  war,  but  descended  from  father  to 
son,  and  one  can  more  readily  trace  the  title  in  Virginia  on  that  account  than  in 
most  of  the  other  Southern  States.  The  prices  of  farms  in  the  south-western 
section  of  the  State,  although  somewhat  influenced  by  local  causes,  and,  there- 
fore, a  little  perplexing  to  the  stranger,  are  reasonably  low.  Land  of  the  best 
quality  can  be  had  at  from  $40  to  $80  per  acre,  and  the  ridges  of  the  mountain? 
for  almost  nothing.  The  present  prices  there  are,  on  the  whole,  an  advance  on 
the  old  ones. 

In  Rockbridge,  Botetourt,  and  Roanoke  counties,  all  surprisingly  rich  in  re- 
sources,  lands  have  declined  in  value  so  that  they  may  be  purchased  at  excel- 
lent bargains.  In  the  Upper  Piedmont  counties  prices  are  variable,  but  under 
the  impetus  given  them  by  a  steady  English  immigration  show  a  tendency  to 
rise.  In  Bedford,  Amherst,  Nelson,  Campbell,  and  Appomattox  counties,  there 
are  thousands  of  acres  of  good  grazing  and  fruit-lands  to  be  bought  for  from 
$2  to  $5  per  acre ;  while  farms  of  the  best  quality,  easily  accessible  to  market, 
are  sold  at  from  $10  to  $30.  In  the  James  River  valley  great  numbers  of  slaves 
were  held  before  the  war.  Emancipation  ruined  hundreds  of  planters  and 
farmers,  and  caused  a  decline  in  the  price  of  the  lands.  Many  a  fine  old 
colonial  estate  is  in  the  market  at  a  small  sum.  The  bottom  lands  in  this 
attractive  valley  have  been  cultivated  for  two  centuries,  but  are  still  fertile 
and  unexhausted.  The  staples  in  the  hill- country  in  the  vicinity  of  Lynch- 
burg are  mainly  wheat,  Indian  corn,  oats,  hay,  and  tobacco.  The  fruits  are 
unrivaled,  and  along  the  eastern  slopes  of  the  Blue  Ridge  mountains  the 
grape  flourishes  luxuriantly,  and  needs_  no  protection  from  the  cold.  The 
farmers  in  the  James  River  valley  say  that  the  bottom  lands  there  will  yield 
from  sixty  to  one  hundred  bushels  of  corn  to  the  acre. 

The  taxes  are  not  heavy.  On  real  estate  in  the  counties  they  amount  to  one 
per  cent,  and  the  property  is  usually  rated  at  only  two-thirds  of  its  cash  value. 
Negro  farm  labor  can  be  engaged  for  from  $8  to  $12  per  month,  with  board;  but 
"board"  means  only  rations  of  bacon,  molasses  and  corn,  which  the  negro  is 
supposed  to  cook  for  himself.  In  the  forests  of  the  hill-country  black-walnut, 
cherry,  and  maple  abound,  and  the  oak,  locust,  chestnut,  hickory,  and  pine  are 
spread  over  one-half  of  the  counties  of  the  Piedmont  section.  Here  and  there 
one  notices  rank  growths  of  pines,  poplars  and  locusts,  which  have  sprung  up 
on  the  neglected  land,  whose  owners  have  no  longer  capital  to  employ  in  cul- 
tivation. There  is  a  statutory  provision  allowing  each  head  of  a  family  to  hold, 
exempt  from  any  process  of  execution  or  levy,  real  and  personal  property  to 
the  amount  of  $2,000.  One-fifth  of  the  tax  money  is  devoted  to  the  uses  of 
free  schools;   but  I  am  inclined  to  believe  that  in  back  sections  of  most  of  the 


566 


BLUE     RIDGE     SPRINGS. 


counties  these  schools  do  not  flourish  to  any  extent — not  so  much  because  of 
any  hostility  toward  them  as  because  of  the  general  apathy  of  the  native  farm- 
ing population  on  the  subject  of  education. 

At  every  town  throughout  this  region  there  are  lovely  mountain  views.  One 
has  lost  sight  of  the  twin  pe^ks  of  Otter  ere  he  arrives  at  Blue  Ridge  Springs, 
a  charming  resort  ensconced  in  a  nook  between  two  huge  ridges,  situated  upon 
the  railroad,  and  connected  with  the  outer  world  by  telegraph  and  numerous 
daily  trains,  the  waters  being  noted  for  their  efficacy  in  special  cases.  The  route 
continues  through  a  rich  farming  country,  and  passes  hill-sides  covered  with  flour- 
ishing vineyards.  The  farmers  on  the  ridges  are  quiet  and  well-disposed  folk. 
Corn-fields  grow  up  to  the  very  doors  of  their  humble  houses.      The  negroes 


Blue  Ridge  Springs,  South-western  Virginia. 


have  little  patches  of  land  here  and  there,  and  seem  industrious  in  their  cultiva- 
tion. Chalybeate  and  sulphur  springs  are  the  attractions  around  which  revolves, 
all  summer  long,  a  pleasant  coterie  from  the  extreme  South.  The  whole  spring 
region  of  this  section  of  Virginia  is  crowded  from  July  until  the  last  of  October 
with  Southern  visitors. 

The  mountain-passes  about  Blue  Ridge  Springs,  the  delightful  roads  running 
out  from  thence  to  Coyner's  and  Bonsack's,  the  lovely  stretches  of  the  Roanoke 
valley,  the  mystic  recesses  of  the  hills  about  "Alleghany,"  the  sweet  tranquillity 
of  the  "Montgomery  White  Sulphur,"  and  the  half-dozen  other  retreats  in  the 
vicinity,  are  all  sought  by  the  overworked  and  climate-worn  who  have  come  thou- 


ALLEGHANY      SPRINGS.  567 

sands  of  miles  for  a  sniff  of  fresh  air.  The  railroad,  seeking  a  way  through  the 
most  practicable  passes  of  the  Alleghanies  and  the  Blue  Ridge,  has  established 
stations  convenient  to  all  these  springs.  For  fifty  miles  the  Atlantic,  Mississippi 
and  Ohio  route  runs  through  a  wild  and  romantic  section,  abounding  in  richest 
mineral  springs,  as  well  as  in  minerals  of  value.  The  most  noticeable  of  the 
fashionable  resorts  are  the  "Alleghany"  and  the  "Montgomery  White."  Both 
have  long  been  famous  among  Southerners;  and  hundreds  of  Northern  pleasure- 
seekers  now  yearly  find  their  way  there. 

Alleghany  Springs,  in  Montgomery  county,  are  near  the  Roanoke  river,  at 
the  eastern  foot  of  the  Alleghany  mountains.  The  hotel,  surrounded  by  a  chain 
of  picturesque  and  comfortable  cottages,  is  only  three  miles  from  the  railroad, 
and  in  all  directions  there  are  ravines  and  recesses  containing  some  of  the 
great  wonders  which  Nature  has  so  lavishly  scattered  through  the  State.  The 
saline  waters  which  are  abundant  at  Alleghany  draw  around  them  hosts  of 
invalids,  and  the  more  robust  visitors  find  health  and  pleasure  in  the  exploration 
of  such  rocky  canons  as  Puncheon  Run  Falls,  where,  through  the  rent  side  of 
the  hills  a  foamy  series  of  cascades  leap  down  2,000  feet  into  abysses,  shrouded 
in  leaves  and  vines,  where  the  black  mosses  cling  to  the  blacker  rocks;  where 
the  laurel  sways  rhythmically  to  the  music  of  the  spray  and  the  sombre  refrain 
of  the  fall.  He  who  would  see  billowy  mountains,  rolling  miles  and  miles 
away,  should  climb  to  "Fisher's  View,"  at  a  short  distance  from  Alleghany. 
Along  the  by-ways  of  this  region  he  will  meet  the  rustic,  clad  in  homespun, 
with  an  ancient  rifle  slung  at  his  shoulder,  and  will  be  surprised  at  his  uncouth 
speech  and  quaint  suspicions  of  the  traveler.  The  mountaineer  looks  scornfully 
upon  the  crowds  of  city  butterflies  who  flit  back  and  forth  through  his  country 
retreats  in  summer,  and  stands,  dumb  with  amazement,  before  the  doors  of  the 
hotel  ball-room,  through  which  he  sees  the  gleam  of  rich  costumes  and  the  sparkle 
of  jewels. 

The  routine  at  all  the  springs  is  much  the  same.  The  hotel  is  usually  a 
roomy  building,  surrounded  by  porches  or  verandas,  and  stands  in  the  middle  of 
a  green  lawn,  dotted  with  the  white  oak  or  some  other  of  the  superb  trees 
abounding  in  the  Virginian  mountains.  In  the  hotel  are  grouped  the  ball  and 
dining-rooms  and  the  general  reception  parlors;  while  in  the  small,  neatly-painted, 
one-story  cottages,  ranged  in  rows,  equidistant  from  the  hotel,  the  visitors  are 
lodged.  There  is  a  host  of  attentive  and  polite  colored  serving- men  and 
women,  ex-valets  and  ex-nurses  of  the  "  before-the-war "  epoch,  and  they  will 
tell  you,  with  pardonable  pride,  "I  used  to  belong  to  ole  Mars'  ,"  men- 
tioning some  name  famous  in  the  annals  of  slave  proprietorship.  Here  one 
can  establish  the  charm  and  seclusion  of  a  home,  and  combine  with  it  the 
benefits  accruing  from  a  sojourn  at  a  watering-place.  Society,  usually  very 
good,  crystallizes  in  the  parlors  of  the  hotels  and  in  the  ball-rooms,  where 
bands  of  colored  musicians  discourse  the  latest  themes  of  Strauss  and  Gungl. 
When  one  tires  of  dancing  and  of  the  promenades  to  the  "springs,"  there 
are  the  mountains,  and  the  strolls  along  ridges  thousands  of  feet  above  the 
level  of  the  sea,  where  the  air  is  always  pure  and  inspiring.     There  is  no  gam 


568  THE      "MONTGOMERY    WHITE      SULPHUR." 

ing,  save  an  innocent  whist  party  by  some  sleepy  old  boys  who  lurk  in  the 
porches,  keeping  out  of  the  strong  morning  sun;  there  is  no  Saratogian  route  of 
carriage  and  drag;  no  crowded  street,  with  ultra  style  predominant  in  every 
costume;  nothing  but  simplicity,  sensible  enjoyment,  and  excellent  taste.  In 
the  sunny  mornings  the  ladies  and  their  cavaliers  wander  about  the  mountain 
pathways;  dress  does  not  exact  homage  until  dinner-time,  and  the  children 
join  with  their  parents  in  the  strolls  and  promenades,  followed  by  the  vener- 
able "aunties,"  black  and  fat,  who  seem  indispensable  appendages  to  every 
Southern  family  having  young  children. 

Montgomery  White  Sulphur  Springs  lie  even  nearer  to  the  main  route  of 
travel  than  those  of  Alleghany.  A  pleasant  ride  of  a  mile  and  a-half  from 
the  Atlantic,  Mississippi  and  Ohio  line,  on  a  horse-railroad  brings  one  to  a  lawn, 
planted  round  about  with  fine  trees,  and  watered  by  a  rippling  brook.  The 
hotel  and  cottage  buildings  are  comfortable  and  elegant;  the  sulphur  and 
chalybeate  springs  are  daily  visited  by  hundreds  in  the  season ;  and  the  ragged 
spur  of  the  Alleghanies  which  backs  the  lawn  is  traversed  by  smooth,  well- 
kept  roads,  over  which  visitors  trot  on  the  brisk  mountain  horses.  At  the 
season's  height  Southern  statesmen,  lawyers,  planters,  journalists,  ex-warriors, 
poets  and  speculators  make  the  Montgomery  White  their  rendezvous ;  and 
illuminations,  balls,  tournaments  and  meetings  follow  one  upon  the  other. 
Four  miles  south-west  are  the  "Yellow  Sulphur  Springs,"  loftily  situated  near 
the  head-waters  of  the  Roanoke,  and  reached  from  the  railway  via  Christians- 
burg.  These  springs,  whose  waters  are  celebrated  for  the  cure  of  children's 
diseases,  and  are  said  to  impart  a  rare  purity  to  the  complexion  of  women, 
are  noted  as  a  quiet  resort  for  families. 

This  spring  region,  abounding  in  all  the  resources  for  the  restoration  of 
health  and  energy,  and  so  rich  in  natural  beauty,  is  as  yet  comparatively 
unknown  to  the  mass  of  Northern  and  Western  people.  For  cheapness  of  price 
and  for  convenience  of  access  it  has  in  America  hardly  an  equal  ;  and  in 
Europe  but  few  watering-places  can  claim  any  superior  advantages  of  that 
nature.  When  the  great  commonwealth  is  thoroughly  developed,  these  beau- 
tiful summer  resorts  will  gradually  become  large  towns,  and  the  charm  of  the 
restful  stillness,  the  possibilityt  of  intimate  communion  with  some  of  nature's 
grandest  phases  which  they  now  afford,  will  be  gone.  The  mob  of  the  sum- 
mer grand  tour  will  rob  them  of  their  chief  charm. 


LXIII. 

AMONG     THE     MOUNTAINS  —  FROM     BRISTOL     TO     LYNCHBURG. 

A  JOURNEY  from  the  Tennessee  line,  northward  toward  Lynchburg,  gave 
me  enlarged  ideas  of  the  possibilities  of  South-western  Virginia.  Bristol 
bestrides  the  line  between  Virginia  and  Tennessee,  and  consequently  has  a 
double  municipal  existence.  Two  Mayors  and  two  sets  of  minor  municipal 
officers  have  jurisdiction  within  its  limits.  It  is  a  pretty  collection  of  neat  houses 
and  busy  shops,  ranged  along  lightly- sloping  hills ;  and  beyond  the  Tennessee 
boundary,  the  blue  range  of  the  Iron  mountains  stands  out  sharply  against  the 
clear  sky. 

The  streets  are  usually  crowded  with  wagon-trains,  immense  canvas-covered 
vehicles,  drawn  by  sober  mules,  and  driven  by  brawny,  long-bearded  backwoods- 


Bristol,  South-western  Virginia. 

men,  or  by  tattered  and  slouching  negroes.  These  trains  ply  back  and  forth 
along  the  difficult  routes  not  yet  reached  by  any  railways,  and  at  night  the  men 
and  mules  camp  together  under  the  open  sky.  Stout  farmers,  splashed  with  the 
reddish  mud  of  the  highways,  rattle  up  and  down  the  main  avenues  on  alert  little 
horses.  At  evening  the  through  train  from  New  Orleans,  bound  for  New  York, 
shrieks  the  note  of  warning  as  it  rolls  into  the  overcrowded  depot,  and  the  pas- 
sengers pour  out  to  the  roomy,  old-fashioned  brick  hotel,  and,  seated  on  wooden 
stools  around  a  long  table,  absorb  the  smoking  fragments  of  hot  chicken  and 
corn-bread  set  before  them.  Here  and  there  the  noise  of  factory  wheels  is  heard, 
and  the  hills  are  crowned  with  neat  edifices  containing  flourishing  schools.  On 
the  Tennessee  side  stands  King's  College,  supported  by  the  Presbyterian  Church 
South,  and  there  are  also  one  or  two  excellent  seminaries  for  women. 

The  i, 800  people  settled  at  Bristol  seem  prosperous  and  contented,  as  they 
may  well  be,  in  view  of  the  chances  for  future  growth  which  the  rapid  multipli- 


570 


THE      NATURAL      TUNNEL. 


cation  of  railway  lines  with  important  connections  is  to  give  the  town.  The 
extension  of  the  Atlantic,  Mississippi  and  Ohio  railroad  from  Bristol  to  Cumber- 
land Gap  will  develop  a  rich  country;  and  when  Bristol  is  receiving  the  great 
currents  of  traffic  directly  from  Memphis  and  Louisville,  it  will  fully  merit  the 


White  Top  Mountain,  seen  from  Glade  Springs. 

title  now  and  then  given  it,  of  "  the  most  .active  town  in  Virginia."  The 
"  Natural  Tunnel,"  forty-two  miles  from  Bristol,  near  the  ford  of  the  Clinch 
river,  is  a  passage,  about  800  feet  in  length,  through  battlements  of  solid  stone. 
The  vaults  of  the  tunnel  rise  to  the  height  of  eighty  feet ;  and,  where  the  arch 
finally  terminates  in  the  mountain  slope,  there  is  a  sheer  precipice  500  feet  high. 
In  a  few  years,  it  is  confidently  expected,  a  railroad  will  find  its  way  through  this 
wonderful  tunnel,  and  the  locomotive's  scream  will  be  heard  on  the  path  over 
which  Daniel  Boone  painfully  toiled,  more  than  a  century  ago,  on  his  pioneering 
pilgrimage  to  the  Kentucky  wilds.  Straight  across  Powell's  mountain  and 
Powell's  valley  to  the  rock-ribbed  Cumberland  range  runs  the  projected  route  of 
the  railway  which  is  to  forge  one  more  link  in  the  great  chain  binding  the  West 
to  the  East.  The  whole  region  adjacent  to  the  main  road  leading  to  Cumberland 
Gap  is  rich  in  tradition  and  natural  wonders.  Not  far  from  the  Natural  Tunnel 
is  a  massive  cave,  in  whose  chambers  hang  thousands  of  stalactites ;  and  near  the 
little  town  of  Estillville,  in  Scott  county,  are  the  "  Holston  Springs,"  where 
chalybeate,  thermal  and  white  sulphur  waters  rise  from  sources  within  a  few 
hand-breadths  of  each  other.  Around  Estillville  the  lands  are  rich  in  minerals ; 
iron  and  copper  abound ;  and  the  lead  deposits  along  the  Clinch  river  have  long 
been  considered  remarkable. 

The  journey  backward  toward    Lynchburg  took    me  through  Abingdon,  a 
nourishing  trade  centre  in  Washington  county,  and  to  Glade  Springs,  whence  one 


SALTVILLE,      VIRGINIA. 


571 


gets  a  peep  at  White  Top  mountain's  lofty  brow.  From  Glade  Springs  I  turned 
aside  to  Saltville,  a  busy  town  connected  with  the  outer  world  by  a  branch  rail- 
road running  in  among  the  queer  hill-knobs  filled  with  plaster,  and  through  the 
valleys  where  salt- wells  are  sunk.  The  country  round  about,  until  one  reaches 
the  Alleghany  ridge,  is  not  unlike  that  portion  of  England  lying  near  Eastbourne, 
with  its  chalk  hills  sparsely  covered  with  grass.  Saltville  is  a  neat  manufact- 
uring village,  nestling  in  a  valley  near  a  defile  in  Walker's  mountain.  The  basin 
of  salt-water  there  yields  nearly  eighty  per  cent,  and,  ever  since  a  Scotchman 
named  King  opened  a  well  in  1780,  the  salines  have  been  extensively  worked. 
During  the  last  war  the  Confederacy  depended  almost  entirely  upon  these  works 
for  salt,  and  the  tremendous  draft  of  ten  thousand  bushels  per  day  was  promptly 
met  by  the  wells.  About  two  thousand  men  were  constantly  employed ;  the 
town  was  thoroughly  fortified ;  each  Southern  State  had  its  private  establish- 
ment, and  the  various  furnaces  are  to-day  known  by  the  names  of  the  States 
which  originally  established  them.  There  was  some  savage  fighting  along  the 
mountain-sides,  and  in  the  defiles,  when  General  Stoneman  tried  to  force  his  way 
into  Saltville  and  destroy  the  precious  stores ;  but,  after  a  severe  repulse,  he 
succeeded  in  gaining  possession  and  burning  everything.  The  stock  company 
now  owning  and  working  the  wells,  manufacture  but  three  thousand  bushels  of 
salt  daily,  sending  it  mainly  to  the  Southern  markets. 


Making  Salt,  at  Saltville,  Virginia. 

The  stout  negroes  working  over  the  boiling  salt  were  both  delighted  and 

amazed  when  their  pictures  appeared  in  the  artist's  sketch-book ;  they  had  never 

seen  "no  such  writin'  befo'."    Great  stores  of  gypsum  are  annually  mined  and 

prepared  for  fertilizers  in  this  valley,  where  also  there  are  some  superb  model 

37 


572  A     CONSERVATIVE      POLITICAL      MEETING. 

farms,  well  stocked  and  separated  one  from  another  by  beautiful  hedges.  Not 
far  from  Saltville  is  Clinch  mountain,  over  which  the  traveler  to  Tazewell  county, 
a  wonderfully  beautiful  mountain  region,  must  climb.  The  fighting  around 
Saltville  was  severest  at  the  time  that  Burbridge  came  from  Kentucky,  intending 
to  break  up  the  Confederate  works  there.  It  was,  I  believe,  the  first  fight  in 
which  colored  troops  entered  as  an  important  element,  and  the  slaughter  of 
them,  as  they  came  struggling  up  the  difficult  hill-sides,  is  said  by  eye-witnesses 
to  have  been  dreadful.  About  six  thousand  troops  were  engaged  on  each 
side. 

In  Tazewell  county,  twenty-five  miles  from  the  line  of  the  Atlantic,  Missis- 
sippi and  Ohio  road,  coal  crops  out  literally  everywhere.  It  furnishes  a  rich 
field  for  investment.  The  mountain  population  is  rude,  but,  as  a  rule,  law- 
abiding,  and  sensible.  Along  the  valley  of  the  Clinch  river,  in  this  county, 
are  many  stretches  of  fertile  fields,  contrasting  strangely  with  the  rocky  cliffs 
rising  around  them.  "Wolf  Creek  Knob,"  clad  in  laurel  and  ivy,  and  "Dial 
Rock,"  near  Jeffersonville,  are  worthy  many  visits.  Railroads,  schools  and  mines 
will  give  this  country  great  riches,  and  a  much  needed  increase  of  education 
in  a  few  years.  The  dialect  of  the  people  is  strange  and  hard ;  their  hospi- 
tality is  unbounded,  and  their  love  for  the  peaks,  among  which  they  raise 
their  droves  of  cattle,  horses,  and  hogs,  amounts  to  devotion.  Their  homes 
are  cleanly,  although  simple  almost  beyond  belief;  their  manners  are  frank, 
and  their  instincts  usually  noble. 

At  Marion  Court-House — a  pleasant  village  near  the  Brush  mountain,  and 
a  fair  type  of  the  average  Virginian  county  seat, — we  arrived  at  a  time  when  the 
Conservative  candidate  for  Governor  of  the  State,  General  Kemper,  was  address- 
ing the  citizens  of  the  county.  Marion  consists  mainly  of  one  long  street,  on 
one  side  of  which  is  the  Court-House,  with  a  lawn  in  front,  and  a  stout  jail  in  the 
rear.  It  was  court-day  as  well  as  a  political  occasion ;  and  the  farmers  had 
assembled  from  many  miles  around. 

The  negroes  are  very  numerous  in  the  vicinage ;  but,  constituting  a  party  by 
themselves,  did  not  flock  about  the  Court-House,  although  two  of  the  better  class 
of  them  lingered  near,  as  if  appointed  as  reporters.  The  court- room  in  which 
the  political  meeting  was  held,  after  the  session  of  the  court  had  been  adjourned 
over  for  a  day  in  deference  to  the  discussion  of  pending  issues,  was  small  and  des- 
titute of  seats.  The  farmers  and  town  residents  dropped  in  at  intervals  during 
the  lucid  and  fluent  speech  made  by  General  Kemper,  and  listened  for  some 
little  time  with  respectful  attention,  although  they  did  not  seem  to  take  that 
thrilling  interest  in  the  irrepressible  conflict  which  I  had  been  led  to  expect. 

The  speeches  of  the  candidate  (since  elected  Governor)  and  his  friends  were 
somewhat  condemnatory  of  the  Administration's  course  with  regard  to  certain 
Southern  States.  It  was  evident  that  the  hearers  present,  with  the  exception 
of  the  negroes,  were  all  of  one  mind,  and  would  vote  the  Conservative  ticket 
without  fail.  But  as  soon  as  the  farmers  had  seen  the  candidate  of  their  party 
for  Governor,  and  heard  him  make  a  few  remarks,  many  of  them  strolled  back 
upon  the  lawn,  and  began  discussing  crops  and  comparing  notes  on  horses.  They 


v 


WAYSIDE      TYPES- IN     VIRGINIA. 


< 


573 


_•    : 


Wayside  Typss— A  Sketch  from  the  Artist's  Virginia  Sketch-Book. 


574 


WHAT      THE      NEGROES     THINK SCHOOLS. 


regarded  the  election  of  the  Conservative  ticket  in  the  State  as  a  foregone  con- 
clusion, and  were  apparently  tired  of  all  political  talk,  preferring  to  attend  to 
their  home  matters,  and  the  bettering  of  their  agricultural  prospects,  rather  than 
to  a  revival  of  past  memories.  By  noon  many  of  them  had  completed  their 
errands,  and  were  riding  out  of  town  on  their  smart  horses,  as  grimly  and 
silently  as  they  had  entered. 

The  negroes  seemed  to  consider  the  Conservative  triumph  as  certain ;  and 
those  who  were  intelligent  were  basing  all  hope  of  an  improvement  in  their  con- 
dition on  the  influences  of  time  rather  than  on  anything  else.  They  hope  to 
make  education  general  among  their  race ;  and,  during  the  four  years  that  the 
Conservatives  will  remain  in  power,  they  think  that  a  more  intelligent  ground- 
work of  politics  may  be  formed.     In  the  back  counties  it  will  be  found  difficult 


Wytheville,  Virginia. 

to  establish  the  free  common  school  on  a  good  and  reliable  basis ;  but,  certainly, 
both  whites  and  blacks  enjoy  excellent  school  facilities  in  most  of  the  larger 
towns.  A  careful  canvass  of  the  counties  in  South-western  Virginia,  and  the 
Piedmont  district,  in  1872,  shows  that,  while  there  was  still  some  marked  oppo- 
sition to  the  free  public  school,  the  sentiment  of  the  mass  was  gradually  be- 
coming favorable  to  it.      • 

There  has  never  been,  since  the  war,  any  inclination  on  the  part  of  the  whites 
to  hinder  the  negro  from  getting  as  much  education  as  he  can  himself  pay  for ; 
and,  although  some  resistance  to  the  collection  of  taxes  for  school  purposes  was 
anticipated  at  the  time  the  system  went  into  operation,  in  1870,  there  never  has 
been  any  worthy  of  the  name.  The  negroes  in  many  of  the  counties  manifest 
more  eagerness  to  enter  school  than  do  the  whites,  but  they  are  not  always  willing 


WYTHE  VI  LLE — MAX      MEADOWS. 


575 


to  pay  something  to  support  the  school.  On  the  whole,  great  progress  has  been 
made ;  the  Peabody  fund  has  done,  and  still  does  good  work  in  Bristol,  Abingdon, 
Marion,  Salem,  Wytheville  and  Lynchburg;  the  number  of  school  edifices  is 
increasing,  and  good  teachers  are  more  readily  procured  than  at  the  outset.  The 
mass  of  the  people  throughout  that  region,  as  in  other  parts  of  Virginia,  would,  I 
think,  prefer  that  the  Legislature  should  take  the  responsibility  of  raising  the  funds 


Max  Meadows,  Virginia.  • 

to  support  the  schools.  At  present  the  supervisors  and  judges  in  each  county 
have  the  power  to  regulate  the  local  school  taxes,  and  the  result  of  this  is  that 
the  school  trustees,  who  are  required  by  law  to  provide  good  school  edifices  for 
the  pupils,  have  not  the  money  with  which  to  build  them.  But  experience 
and  improved  sentiment  are  gradually  regulating  all  these  matters. 

Near  Marion,  and  in  the  mountains  back  of  the  town,  the  deposits  of  iron 
ores  promise  to  be  very  rich,  and  furnaces  will  soon  be  established  there.  Bary- 
tes  has  long  been  mined  in  the  vicinity.  In  the  adjoining  county,  at  Wytheville, 
a  pretty  town  lying  on  the  western  slope  of  a  spur  of  the  Alleghanies,  2,000  feet 
above  tide-water,  we  saw  fine  specimens  of  coal,  iron,  lead  and  zinc  ore,  mined 
in  the  vicinity*  The  Austinville  lead  mines,  near  by,  have  been  worked  for  more 
than  a  century.  All  the  zinc  is  at  present  transported  to  the  Eastern  States 
before  being  smelted. 

A  little  more  than  six  miles  from  Wytheville  several  extensive  coal  veins 
have  been  opened,  and  ample  stores  of  limestone  are  found  near  these  veins,  so 
that  furnaces  and  rolling-mills  would  get  their  material  ready  to  hand,  if  erected 
at  such  an  excellent  point  on  the  Atlantic,  Mississippi  and  Ohio  line  as  Wythe- 
ville. The  water  power  in  the  vicinity  is  magnificent.  Beyond  lie  Kent's  Mill 
and  Max  Meadows,  the  latter  a  lovely  pastoral  landscape  dotted  with  fine  stock. 
To  Max  Meadows  zinc  and  pig-iron  are  brought  in  large  quantities  from  the 
country  between  the  station  and  the  North  Carolina  mountain  frontier.  In  that 
section  there  are  also  extensive  lead  and  shot  works,  and  silver  enough  is  scat- 
tered  in   the   zinc-beds  to  pay  the  men  mining  the  latter  for  their  work.      At 


576 


ALONG      THE      NEW      RIVER. 


Dublin,  a  little  village  in  the  midst  of  fertile  fields,  there  are  large  iron  interests. 
This  is  a  depot  whence  many  shipments  of  the  celebrated  short-horn  beef  cattle 
are  made.  As  soon  as  the  railway  now  prompting  the  growth  of  these  interests 
can  shoot  out  its  feeders  on  either  side,  the  number  of  tons  of  minerals  annually 
exported  from  Virginia  will  be  quadrupled.  Not  far  from  this  point  the  owners 
of  the  Radford  Iron  Works  of  Philadelphia  are  shipping  pig-iron  from  a  newly- 
erected  furnace. 

The  banks  of  New  river  are  so  lovely  in  the  autumn  time,  that  we  determined 
not  to  hasten  by  them  in  the  express  train;  so  we  mounted  upon  a  hand-car, 
which  the  strong  arms  of  two  stout  negroes  sent  down  grade  at  thirty,  and  up 
the  toilsome  ascents  at  five,  miles  an  hour.  The  river,  a  few  miles  beyond  Dub- 
lin, is  broad  and  wonderfully  clear,  mirroring  in  its  placid  breast  the  verdure- 
bordered  banks,  and  the  rich  foliage  of  the  forests  along  the  cliffs,  to  whose  sides 
the  railway  confidingly  clings. 


The  Roanoke  Valley,  Virginia.     [Page  577. 

Traversing  the  stream,  and  mounting  a  little  hill,  we  caught  a  view  of  "  Bald 
Knob."  The  bare  poll  of  the  venerable  mountain  was  touched  by  the  afternoon 
sunlight  as  we  looked,  and  the  great  height  formed  an  admirable  background  to 
the  richly  broken  landscape  along  the  riverside.  One  may  make  a  pleasant 
voyage  on  the  New  river  from  this  point  to  Eggleston's  Springs,  twenty-five  miles 
further  down  the  current,  taking  one  of  the  many  bateaux  which  ply  constantly 
on  the  stream,  and  simply  drifting  on  the  lazy  wave  until  the  destination  is 
reached.  Within  easy  distance  of  these  springs  one  comes  upon  the  greatest 
natural  wonder  of  the  Virginian  mountains, — a  pond  or  lake,  having  no  visible 
source  of  supply,  sunk  in  a  kind  of  earth  cup,  on  a  height  4,500  feet  above  the 
level  of  the  sea.  It  has  been  forming  and  enlarging  for  more  than  sixty  years, 
and  is  now  about  three-quarters  of  a  mile  long  by  a  third  of  a  mile  wide.  Sub- 
merged trees  can  be  seen  beneath  its  pellucid  surface;   and  a  line  hundreds  of 


CHRISTIANSBURG  — THE     ROANOKE     VALLEY. 


577 


feet  long  if  let  down  its  middle  waters,  will  not  touch  bottom.  Higher  up,  in 
the  same  range,  is  the  «  Bald  Knob,"  the  view  from  whose  sumimt  M  considered 
quite  as  grand  as  that  from  the  Peak  of  Otter. 

A  little  beyond  New  river  we  stopped  at  a  primitive  coal  station,  where  great 
heaps  of  the  black  diamonds,  newly  brought  from  "Brush"  mountain,  were  lying. 
As  I  inquired  the  name  of  the  mine  from  which  they  came,  a  by-statute 
answered,  "The  mountain  is  all  coal,  and  every  farmer  is  his  own  miner. 

At  Christiansburg,  which  is  in  the  spring  region,  we  were  not  far  from  the  site 
of  the  new  State  Agricultural  and    Mechanical   College  at  Blacksburg       The 
"farm"  attached  to  the  college  comprises  two  hundred  and  fifty  acres,  lying  m 
the  fertile  "Valley  of  Virginia,"  and  with  veins  of  coal  of  superior  quahty,  and 
arge  bodies  o ^  timber  within  easy  reach.     Climbing  over  the  huge  grades  which 
dominate   he  Alleghanies  at  this  point,  and  passing  through  the  deep  cuts  in  the 
roc"  ribbed  Kills  near  the  stations  giving  access  to  Montgomery  White  Sulpha 
Ind  Alleghany  Springs,  we  came  suddenly  upon  the  delicious  expanse  of  the 
Roanoke  valley,  bathed  in  the  splendid  shimmer  of  an  afternoon  autumn  sun 
and  fading  into  delicate*  colored  shadows  where  the  mountains  rose  gently  as  if 
loth  to  leave  the  lowly  retreat.      The  vale  was  filled  with  wheat  and  corn  fields, 
and  with  perfect  meadows,  through  which  ran  little  brooks  gleammg  in  the  sum 
After  crossing  the  Roanoke  river  we  came  into  a  reg.on  covered  with  fine 
fieldt tobacco,gwhich  extended  far  up  the  hill-sides.     Just  below  is  the  pleasant 
station  of  "Big  Spring,"  to  which  we  had  been  gradually  descending  for  some 


View  near  Salem,   Virginia. 


time  on  the  high  cliffs  along  the  side  of  the  Roanoke  valley^  At  Big  Spring  a 
profusion  of  iron  and  copper  ore  has  been  found  Salem,  the  site  of ^Roanoke 
College,  is  surrounded  by  charming  hills,  and  stands  in  one  of  ******»&&: 
tural  regions  in  the  United  States.  Near  Salem  are  some  lovely  streams, 
bordered  by  rich  foliage.     Throughout  the  adjacent  sections  the  farmers  are  very 


578 


SOUTH-WESTERN    VIRGINIA'S     FUTURE. 


well-to-do,  many  owning  from  1,200  to  1,300  acres  of  land,  worth  $80  to  $90 
per  acre.  Tobacco  and  the  cereals  are  grown  there  in  large  quantities.  Salem 
and  "Big  Lick,"  just  beyond,  export  immense  quantities  of  cereals.  Salem 
stands  at  the  head  of  navigation  on  the  Roanoke,  and  communicates  with 
Weldon,  in  North  Carolina.  Here,  too,  it  is  hoped  that  a  road,  opening  up  the 
Shenandoah  valley,  will  connect  with  the  Atlantic,  Mississippi  and  Ohio  line. 

The  wealth  of  this  region  is  by  no  means  developed  yet.  South-western 
Virginia  proper,  which  remained  so  long  unexplored  after  the  valley  and  the 
Potomac  shores  had  been  carefully  studied,  has  a  grand  future.  As  a  field  for 
immigrants  who  have  capital,  and  intelligence,  for  the  better  class  of  large  farm- 
ers, and  for  workers  in  metal,  it  cannot  be  surpassed.  An  empire  in  itself,  with 
every  resource  conceivable,  it  is  not  wonderful  that  that  rare  soldier,  General 
Lee,  boasted  that  he  "  could  carry  on  the  war  for  twenty  years  from  those 
western  mountains." 


View  on  the  James  River  below  Lynchburg. 


LXIV. 


PETERSBURG — A      NEGRO      REVIVAL      MEETING. 

THE  journey  from  Lynchburg  to  Petersburg  calls  up  many  memories. 
Eight  years  ago  the  mad  rush  of  desperate  and  final  battle  swept  across 
it.  From  the  log  and  earth  parapets  of  Five  Forks,  where  Pickett's  forces  met 
their  doom  at  the  hands  of  Sheridan ;  from  the  Appomattox  and  from  Hatcher's 
Run ;  from  Fort  Gregg,  where  the  splendid  Mississippians  held  on  against  hope 
and  fate  until  nearly  all  of  them  had  perished;  from  the  intrenchments  of 
deserted  Petersburg;  from  Burkesville;  from  the  road  to  Jetersville,  over  which 
Sheridan  and  the  "Fifth"  went  clattering;  from  Amelia  Court-House  and  from 
Sailor's  Creek ;  from  the  High  Bridge,  and  from  Cumberland  Church  near  Farm- 
ville,  where  Mahone  made  his  heroic  stand,  and  would  not  be  driven ;  from  all 
the  bloody  and  memorable  fields  which  stretch,  sunlit  and  peaceful  now,  from  the 


Appomattox  Court-House — "It  lies  silently  half- hidden  in  its  groves  and  gardens."     [Page  580.] 


hills  around  Petersburg  to  the  village  of  Appomattox  Court-House,  come  echoes 
which  recall  to  us  some  faint  impressions  of  the  splendor  and  the  grandeur  of  that 
last  resistance  of  the  broken  army  of  Northern  Virginia. 

.Along  the  line  of  rail  where  now  currents  of  trade  flow  stronger  and  more 
steadily  than  in  the  most'  prosperous  days  of  the  old  regime,  raged  a  gigantic 
struggle,  the  very  traces  of  which  seem  to  have  passed  away.  Now  and  then  the 
eye  catches  the  outline  of  a  grass- grown  intrenchment,  in  the  midst  of  some 
well -cultivated  field;  but  there  are  notably  few  marks  of  that  wild  series  of 
battles  by  day  and  flights  and  pursuits  by  night  which  ended  when  Gordon, 
with  the  advance  guard  of  Lee's  exhausted  army,  had  charged  successfully 
against  the  cavalry  ranged  in  front  of  him,  only  to  find  that  behind  that  cavalry 
were  the  blue  infantry  lines  which  foretold  the  necessity  of  surrender. 


[}80  APPOMATTOX      COURT-HOUSE. 

There  is  nothing  especially  interesting  in  Appomattox  Court- House.  The 
little  village  lies  at  a  short  distance  from  the  railway  station,  around  which  idle 
negroes  are  always  lounging.  It  lies  silently  half-hidden  in  its  groves  and  gardens, 
as  if  frightened  at  the  notoriety  it  has  achieved.  The  house  where  Lee  and  Grant 
arranged  the  terms  of  surrender  is  pointed  out  to  the  Northern  visitor ;  but  aside 
from  its  associations,  it  has  nothing  to  recommend  it  to  attention.  The  surround- 
ing country,  however,  is  quite  beautiful.  Farmville,  so  memorable  for  the  battles 
in  its  vicinity,  seems  alert  and  full  of  energy ;  it  has  the  stamp  of  a  New  England 
town  in  the  vivacity  of  its  streets,  as  I  saw  them.  It  has  long  been  an  important 
tobacco  market,  and  the  people  are  prosperous  and  progressive.  Hampden- 
Sidney  College  is  not  many  miles  away ;  and  a  short  distance  below  the  town  is 
the  famous  "  High  Bridge,"  simply  a  railway  viaduct,  where  General  Mahone 
had  proposed,  in  those  terrible  days  of  April,  1865,  to  make  one  of  his  stubborn 
fights,  but  whence  he  was  forced  to  fall  back  to  his  position  at  "the  church." 
The  fields  on  which  one  looks  down  from  this  great  bridge — a  triumph  of 
engineering — are  beautifully  cultivated  in  tobacco  and  corn.  The  valley  was 
delicious  in  color,  as  I  passed  through  it  in  an  autumn  sunlight. 

Below  Burkesville  the  cotton-fields  were  numerous  ;  acres  were  white  with 
the  pretty  shrub's  blossoms,  and  the  intrenchments  of  eight  years  ago  were  here 
and  there  covered  with  them.  Seen  from  a  distance,  Petersburg  presents  the 
appearance  of  a  lovely  forest,  pierced  by  church  spires  and  towers.  On  entering 
it,  one  sees  many  signs  of  commercial  prosperity.  Along  the  railroad  line  in 
the  suburbs  are  large  cotton-mills,  and  the  much  beleaguered  town  now  echoes 
to  the  whirr  of  spindles,  and  the  ring  of  hammers  on  tobacco-hogsheads. 

The  negroes  were  slightly  in  the  majority  in  Petersburg  at  the  time  of  my 
visit.  As  at  Lynchburg,  the  Northerner  is  at  first  amazed  by  the  mass  of  black 
and  yellow  faces.  The  hackmen  who  shriek  in  your  ear  as  you  arrive  at  the 
depot,  the  brakeman  on  the  train,  the  waiter  in  the  hotel,  all  are  African.  In  the 
tobacco  factories  hundreds  of  dusky  forms  are  toiling,  and  an  equal  number  are 
slouching  in  the  sunshine.  On  the  day  of  my  visit  a  colored  Masonic  excursion 
had  arrived  from  Richmond,  and  the  streets  were  filled  with  stout  negro  men, 
decently  clothed,  and  their  wives  and  sweethearts,  attired  in  even  louder  colors 
than  those  affected  by  Northern  servant  girls.  Each  was  talking  vociferously ; 
officials,  in  flaunting  regalia  and  sweating  at  every  pore,  rushed  to  and  fro ; 
bands  thundered  and  urchins  screamed.  The  Virginia  negro  has  almost  the 
French  passion  for  fete-days ;  he  is  continually  planning  some  excursion  or 
"reunion,"  and  will  readily  consent  to  live  in  a  cellar  and  submit  to  poor  fare 
for  the  sake  of  saving  money  to  expend  in  frolic. 

At  Petersburg  the  negroes  are  from  time  to  time  largely  represented  in  the 
Common  Council,  and  sometimes  have  a  controlling  voice  in  municipal  affairs. 
The  white  citizens  have  readily  adapted  themselves  to  circumstances,  and  the 
session  of  the  Council  which  I  attended  was  as  orderly  and,  in  the  main,  as  well 
conducted  as  that  of  any  Eastern  city.  There  was,  it  is  true,  an  informality  in 
the  speech  of  some  of  the  colored  members  which  was  ludicrous,  but  it  was 
evident  that  all  were  acting  intelligently,  and  had  come  to  some  appreciation  of 


PETERSBURG ITS      SCHOOLS. 


58l 


their  responsibilities.  Most  of  the  colored  members  were  full  types  of  the 
African.  In  some  matters  they  readily  admit  the  superiority  01"  the  white  man  in 
legislation,  and  in  Petersburg  willingly  gave  the  management  of  the  city  finances 
into  the  hands  of  the  elder  Conservative  members  of  the  Council.  The  Commis- 
sioner of  Streets  and  the  Engineer  of  the  Board  of  Waterworks  were  both 
negroes.  The  mayoralty  and  the  other  city  offices  remained,  at  the  epoch  of  my 
visit,  in  the  hands  of  white  Radicals,  and  the  negroes  had  made  no  special 
struggle  to  secure  them,  although  they  are  to  the  whites  in  the  city  as  eleven  to 


"The  hackmen  who  shriek  in  your  ear  as  you  arrive  at  the  depot."     [Page  580.] 


nine.  The  Conservatives  allege  that  they  are  unable  to  compete  with  the 
negroes  in  tricks  at  election-time.  They  say,  among  other  things,  that  they 
have  never  been  able  to  secure  burial  records  of  the  negro  population,  since  it  is 
their  custom  to  make  a  dead  voter  renew  his  life  in  the  person  of  one  of  his 
friends. 

The  Petersburg  schools  are  noteworthy  examples  of  Virginian  progress  since 
the  war,  and  merit  the  warmest  encomiums.  No  attempt  has  been  made  by 
black  or  white  to  insist  upon  the  education  of  the  races  together,  it  being  tacitly 
allowed  on  both  sides  that  it  would  not  be  wise.  Petersburg's  general  free  sys- 
tem  of  public  schools  was    founded  in    1868,   when  $2,000  of  the  "  Peabody 


582 


THE      INDUSTRIES      OF      PETERSBURG. 


Fund "  was  contributed,  on  condition  that  the  city  should  raise  $20,000,  and 
with  it  establish  schools  for  all  classes  and  colors.  By  the  second  year  nearly 
3,000  pupils  were  enrolled,  and  both  whites  and  blacks  are  now  given  all  facili- 
ties for  a  thorough  education.     The  colored   young  men  have  not,  as  a  mass, 


"The  'Crater,'  the  chasm  created  by  the  explosion  of  the  mine  which 'the  Pennsylvanians 
sprung  underneath  Lee's  fortifications." 

made  any  special  demand  for  instruction  in  the  higher  branches  ;  their  main 
desire  is  for  a  knowledge  of  reading,  writing,  arithmetic,  and  such  general  study  as 
will  enable  them  to  speak  in  public  or  to  preach;  but  the  girls  in  many  of  the  negro 
schools  are  capable  of  mastering  Caesar,  and  can  write  correct  French  exercises. 

About  5,000  negroes  are  at  work  in  the  tobacco  warehouses ;  in  the  cotton- 
mills  white  labor  exclusively  is  employed.  Eight  of  these  mills  are  established 
in  and  near  the  city,  viz.  :  the  Mattoaca,  Ettricks,  Battersea,  Davis,  Roper  & 
Co's,  Swift  Creek,  Kevan,  and  Lynch.  Two  thousand  operatives  are  employed 
in  manufacturing  cotton.  Numbers  of  Scotchmen  have  settled  in  the  vicinity, 
and  some  of  them  are  largely  interested  in  the  mills.  Petersburg's  annual 
receipts  of  cotton  and  tobacco  are  very  large.  During  the  last  year  42,500 
bales  of  cotton  and  14,000  hogsheads  of  tobacco  were  received.  The  flouring- 
mills  of  the  city  have  a  capacity  of  1,000  barrels  daily.  This  thriving  com- 
munity of  18,000  persons  has  shrewdly  thrust  itself  between  Richmond  and  the 
northern  counties  of  North  Carolina,  and  has  thus  secured  a  large  portion  of  the 
trade  which  the  capital  considered  its  own.  Petersburg  supplies  the  planters 
and  farmers  of  the  adjacent  State  with  bacon  and  corn,  and  in  return  takes 
tobacco  and  cotton.  The  Atlantic,  Mississippi  and  Ohio  railroad  opens  up  to  it 
long  stretches  of  fertile  country. 

The  town  contains  many  charming  avenues,  bordered  with  elegant  mansions 
embowered  in  foliage ;  some  of  the  business  streets  are  quaint  and  almost  foreign 
in  aspect  The  Appomattox  makes  here  and  there  a  picturesque  waterfall ;  the 
hill  on  which  the  old  cemetery  and  ruined,  ivy-mantled  Blandford  Church  stand 
commands  a  lovely  view  of  the  city,  around  which,  in  every  direction,  miles  on 
miles,  stretch  the  decaying  intrenchments,  batteries,  and  forts  of  the  great  siege. 
The  lines  along  the  eastern  and  southern  suburbs  are  still  pretty  clearly  denned ; 
but  the  traces  of  the  battles  have  nearly  all  vanished.     The  "  Crater,"  the  chasm 


MEMORIALS      OF     THE    WAR. 


583 


created  by  the  explosion  of  the  mine  which  the  Pennsylvanians  sprung  under- 
neath Lee's  fortifications,  on  that  dread  day  of  the  unsuccessful  assault  in  July, 
1 864,  is  overgrown  with  shrubbery ;  and  the  farmer,  who  points  out  the  old  lines  of 
the  two  armies,  says  that  he  himself  can  hardly  realize  that  his  farm  was  once  a 
mighty  fortified  camp.  Along  what  was  known  as  the  "  new  intrenched  line," 
constructed  after  the  explosion  and  the  consequent  battle, — and  around  the  worn 
earthworks  of  Forts  "Hell"  and  "Damnation,"* — some  marks  of  strife  are  yet 
noticeable.  The  National  cemetery,  with  its  3,000  graves,  near  the  "  Poplar 
Spring  Church,"  and  the  lot  on  Cemetery  Hill,  devoted  to  "  Our  Soldiers,"  where 
sleep  the  Confederate  dead ;  the  little  church  which  a  regiment  of  New  York 
engineers  erected  during  the  weary  months  of  the  siege,  and  (when  they  left  for 
Five  Forks)  presented  to  their  enemies;  the  "Signal  Tower,"  built  by  the  same 
hands ;  and,  scattered  in  the  vales  and  along  the  slopes,  some  vaguely-defined 
ruins  of  rifle-pit  and  subterranean  passage,  of  bomb-proof  and  sharpshooter's 
lurking-hole,  are  all  that  remain  as  memorials  of  the  fierce  and  deadly  struggle 
which  lasted  ten  months,  and  cost  many  thousands  of  lives. 

During  our  stay  in  this  section  a  "revival  meeting"  was  announced  by  the 
colored  brethren  of  the  surrounding  country,  to  be  held  at  a  little  station  half-way 
between  Richmond  and  Petersburg,  and  we  determined  to  be  present.  On  a 
beautiful  Sunday  morn- 
ing we  drove  out  through 
the  fields,  in  which,  the 
oak  timber  having  been 
cut  away,  a  rank  growth 
of  pine  had  sprung  up ; 
and  stopping  a  massive 
coal  black  man,  dressed 
in  white  duck,  with  a 
flaming  red  necktie  at 
his  throat,  we  inquired 
"the  way." 

"  Ef  yo'  want  to  go 
to  Zion's  Hill,  dat  yer  's 
de  way ;  but  ef  yo'  want 
to  go  whar  de  good 
preachin'  is,  dis  yer  road 
'11  take  yo'  to  it." 

Presently  we  arrived 
at  a  large  frame  build- 
ing, much  like  a  country 
school  -  house,  save  that 
it  was  neither  ceiled  nor  plastered,  and  therein  the  revivalists  were  gathered. 
A  powerful  spiritual  wave  had  swept  over  the  colored  population,  and  dozens 
of  carts,  loaded  with  dusky  searchers  for  truth,  came  rolling  along  the  rough 
*  Sobriquets  given  Forts  Sedgwick  and  Mahone. 


"The  old  cemetery,  and  ruined,  ivy-mantled  Blandford  Church."     [Page  582.] 


584 


A     NEGRO      SERMON. 


roads,  and  stopped  before  the  primitive  door.  Entering,  we  found  represented 
every  shade  of  color,  from  the  coal  black  full- blood  to  the  elegantly  dressed 
and  well-mannered  octoroon.  The  congregation  was  not  large.  Owing  to 
the  excitement  which  had  prevailed  for.  several  previous  Sabbaths,  many  had 
retired,  worn  out,  from  the  spiritual  feast.  The  women  sat  on  the  left  side,  the 
men  on  the  right  of  a  broad  aisle,  running  to  a  plain  wooden  pulpit,  in  which 
were  three  moon-faced  negroes,  two  of  them  preachers,  and  the  third  a  State 
Senator. 

In  front  of  the  pulpit,  behind  a  little  table,  stood  an  olive-colored  elderly 
man,  neatly  dressed,  and  with  a  wildness  in  his  eyes,  and  an  intensity  written 
upon  his  lips  which  reminded  me  of  what  I  had  read  of  the  "  Convulsionists  of 
St.  Medard."  The  audience  was  breathless  with  attention  as  the  preacher,  a 
strolling  missionary,  supported  by  Quakers  in  Louisiana,  took  up  the  great  Bible, 
and,  poising  it  on  his  lean,  nervous  hand,  poured  forth  such  an  impassioned 
appeal  that  I  fairly  trembled.  I  was  not  prepared  for  such  vehemence.  Never, 
in  the  history  of  New  England  revivalism,  was  there  such  a  scene.  The  preacher 
stood  with  many  of  his  hearers  well  around  him ;  one  of  the  deacons  and 
exhorters,  a  black  giant  in  spectacles,  was  his  point  d'apptii,  and  to  him  he 
appealed  from  time  to  time,  shaking  him  roughly  by  the  shoulder,  and  hissing 
his  words  in  his  ear  with  fiery  vehemence.  The  proposition  with  which  he 
started  was  somewhat  incomprehensible  to  us,  viz.  :  "  Christ  is  the  creating  power 
of  God  ;"  but  the  proposition  was  of  no  consequence,  because  every  few  moments 
he  would  burst  into  paroxysms  of  exhortation,  before  which  the  emotional 
audience  rocked  and  trembled  like  reeds  in  a  wind.  He  had  a  peculiar  way  of 
addressing  himself  suddenly  and  in  a  startling  manner  to  some  individual  in  the 
congregation,  dancing,  and  pounding  the  table  furiously  with  both  hands,  in  the 
agony  of  his  exhortation  to  that  person. 

From  time  to  time  he  would  draw  in  his  breath  with  great  force,  as  if  repress- 
ing a  sob,  and,  when  speaking  of  love  and  salvation,  he'  inevitably  fell  into  a 
chant,  or  monotone,  which  was  very  effective.  Under  the  hurricanes  of  his 
appeal,  the  fury  -of  his  shouting,  the  magnetic  influence  of  his  song,  one  of  the 
old  deacons  went  into  a  spasm  of  religious  fervor,  and  now  and  then  yelled  vocif- 
erously. A  milder  brother  ventured  to  remonstrate,  whereupon  the  Quaker 
preacher  turned  upon  him,  saying  loudly : 

"Let  dat  brudder  shout,  an'  'tend  to  dine  own  business  !" 

Then  he  began  preaching  against  hypocrisy.  He  seemed  especially  to  chide 
the  women  for  becoming  converted  with  too  great  ease.  "  Woe  !"  he  cried,  "woe 
unto  dat  woman  what  goes  down  into  the  water  befo'  she  ready ;  woe  unto  her !" 
with  a  long,  singing  descent  on  the  last  words ;  and  then  he  added,  sotto  voce, 
"  Dat  what  make  so  many  women  come  up  stranglin'  an'  vomitin'  an'  pukin'  outen 
de  water ;  de  debbil  dat  still  in  'em  git  hole  on  'em,  an'  shake  'em  an'  choke  'em 
under  de  water !  Let  no  woman  shout  for  Jesus  what  don't  know  'bout  Jesus  ! 
It 's  one  thing  to  git  to  Heaven,  but  it 's  anudder  to  git  in  !  Don'  ye  know  what 
Heaven  is  ?  Heaven 's  God  !  We  must  know  what  we  is  preachin'  about,  an'  ef 
we  don't  we  ought  to  SET  down  !"     (This  with  terrific  emphasis.) 


"DIE      RIGHT,     BRUDDER," FATHER     JUPITER. 


585 


In  describing  the  creation,  he  said:  "  Breddren,  it 's  now  12,877  years  sence 
de  good  Lord  made  de  world,  an'  de  morning  stars  sung  togedder.  Dat  wdrtt 
yesterday !  Ha !  read  de  Book  o'  Job,  'n  see  for  yerself !  Dat  wdrit  a  month 
ago  !  I  was  n't  dar  deti!"  (thus  illustrating  with  sublime  scorn  the  littleness  of 
man),  "  but  by  de  grace  of  God,  I  '11  git  dar  by  'n'  by !"  (here  his  voice  was  faint 
and  suggestive  of  tearful  joy)  "to  join  de  mornin'  stars,  an'  we  '11  all  sing  togedder! 

"  Oh,  yes !  oh,  yes !  Heaven's  God  made  de  world  an'  de  fullness  darof,  an' 
hung  it  up  on  de  high  hooks  of  heaven.  Dar  wa'n't  no  nails  dar;  no  hammer 
dar;  no  nothin'  but  de  word  of  God."  In  hinting  at  the  terrors  of  death  to  the 
unconverted,  he  sang  wild  word-pictures  which  had  a  certain  rude  force  even  for  us, 
and  then  shrieked  out  these  sentences :  "  Ef  de  brudders  don't  want  to  die  in  de 
dark,  dey  must  git  Christ  to  hole  de  candle.  God's  grace  shall  be  de  candle  in  de 
good  brudder's  heart.  Devils  may  howl,  lions  may  roar,  but  nothin'  shall  daunt 
dat  brudder's  heart.  Angels  shall  come  down  with  lighted  candles  in  deir  hands 
to  congratulate  de  brudder."     Then,  once  more  screaming  and  dancing  and  weep- 


'Seen  from  a  distance,  Petersburg  presents  the  appearance  of  a  lovely  forest  pierced  here 
and  there  by  church  spires  and  towers."     [Page  580.] 

ing,  he  uttered  these  words :  "  Die  right,  brudder,  V  yo'  shall  not  die  in  de 
night ;  yo'  shall  die  in  eternal  day.  Ef  Christ  don't  bring  light  enough,  den  God 
will  come  wid  his  candle ;  an'  ef  dat  ain't  enough,  den  de  Holy  Ghost  '11  come 
wid  his  candle,  too,  an'  dar  can't  be  no  more  night  wid  dat  brudder's  soul." 

At  another  period  in  the  sermon,  he  said :  "  Ef  we  can't  preach  God,  we  can 
exhort  Him ;  ef  we  can't  exhort  Him,  we  can  live  Him  ;  an'  ef  we  can't  live 
Him,  we  can  die  Him.  I  've  served  under  Him  forty-two  long  year — longer  dan 
Moses  led  Israel  in  de  wilderness ;  an'  ef  I  don'  know  what  God  is,  den  I  'd 
better  shut  tip  an'  go  home  ! ! !  Jesus  snatched  my  soul  from  hell  forty-two  year 
ago  in  Fredericksburg,  in  old  Vaginny  !  Praise  Him  !  O  praise  Him  !  Let  no 
brudder  shout  for  Jesus  who  don'  know  Jesus." 

After  the  more  furious  passages  of  exhortation  were  over,  he  gave  his  ideas 
upon  prayer,  something  in  this  wise :  "  Dar  was  ole  Fadder  Jupiter  (a  colored 
preacher).  Now  Jupiter  he  used  to  git  a  Bible  in  one  han'  an'  a  pra'r-book  in 
anudder,  an'  a  hymn-book  under  his  arm ;  an'  den  he  'd  start  out  to  see  de  wid- 
ders  'n'  de  fadderless ;  'n'  one  day  I  met  old  Fadder  Jupiter,  'n'  I  say  to  him  : 
'  Fadder  Jupiter,  how  many  pounds  of  meat  have  yo'  prayed  ?     How  many 


$86  a      MODEL     PRAYER-BOOK SCENE      AT     THE      ALTAR. 

pounds  of  sugar  have  yo'  exhorted  ?  How  many  cups  of  coffee  have  yo'  sung  to 
dem  pore  widders  'n'  fadderless  ?'  'N'  he  says:  '  Not  one.'  'N'  den  I  say  :  '  Tears 
like,  Fadder  Jupiter,  yo  '11  sing  here,  and  pray  dar,  'n'  yo  '11  pray  every  widder  to 
death  'n'  sing  every  fadderless  child  to  de  grave;  'n'  call  in  help  to  bury  'em.'  'N' 
den  I  told  him  dat  when  he  sung  he  must  call  a  bar'l  o'  flour  long  metre,  'n'  fur  short 
metre  he  must  take  a  keg  of  lard,  'n'  dat  's  short  enough,  anyhow ;  and  fur  par- 
ticler  metre  nice  ham  'n'  some  coffee;  'n'  den  he  mus'  take  de  Quaker  pra'r-book, 
a  two-wheeled  cart,  'n'  fill  up  de  ole  pra'r-book  with  coal ;  'n'  when  de  col'  wed- 
der  come  he  must  drive  de  ole  pra'r-book  down  to  some  widder  sister's,  'n'  say  : 
'  Sister,  I  've  come  to  pray  six  bushels  of  coal  with  yo',  'n'  den  open  de  cellar  door, 
dump  de  ole  pra'r-book,  'n'  pray  de  cellar  full  o'  coal.'" 

The  sermon  was  interspersed  with  impassioned  recitations  from  Watts  and 
Wesley.  There  was  no  logic,  and  no  clear  idea  of  anything  except  the  love  of 
God  and  charity.  Now  and  then,  with  pompous  air,  the  speaker  would  say :  "An' 
now,  breddren,  we  will  proceed  to  consider  de  third  (or  fourth  or  fifth)  point,"  and 
after  a  moment  of  solemn  cogitation,  would  plunge  into  exhortation,  appeal,  and 
sarcasm,  and  yell  until  the  rafters  rang.  His  face  was  convulsed,  and  sobs  shook 
his  whole  frame  when  he  sat  down.  A  strange  wild  hymn  was  sung,  the  singers 
waving  their  bodies  to  and  fro  to  the  measure  of  the  music. 

One  of  the  ministers  then  arose,  and  bade  those  who  desired  the  prayers  of 
the  church  to  come  forward  and  lay  their  sins  upon  the  altar.  An  indescribable 
rush  of  some  twenty  persons  ensued.  Old  men  and  young  girls  hastened 
together  to  the  pulpit,  and  knelt  with  their  faces  bowed  upon  their  hands,  and  a 
low  tremulous  prayer  to  "  O  my  Heavenly  Fadder,"  was  heard,  as  one  of  the 
old  deacons  poured  forth  his  soul  in  supplication.  During  the  prayer  an 
exhorter  passed  around  among  the  congregation,  singling  out  the  impenitent, 
and  personally  addressing  them  :  "  Yo'  better  go  now  !v  "  How  '11  yo'  feel  when 
it 's  too  late,  'n'  dar  ain't  no  gittin  dar  ?  "  In  a  short  time  the  church  resounded 
to  groans  and  prayers,  high  over  all  of  which  was  heard  the  clear  voice  of 
the  colored  Quaker  chanting : 

"For  everywhar  I  went  to  pray 
I  met  all  hell  right  on  my  way," 

"  but  Heaven's  God,  V  we  '11  get  dar  by  'n'  by.  O  praise  Him !  O  bless  Him, 
'n'  sing  'wid  de  mornin'  stars !" 

Some  of  the  colored  preachers,  although  they  make  extravagant  pretensions, 
are  by  no  means  so  moral  as  our  "  Fadder  Quaker,"  and,  exercising  absolute 
spiritual  control  over  their  ignorant  flocks,  prompt  them  to  unworthy  deeds,  and 
fill  their  minds  with  wrong  ideas.  There  is  also  a  multitude  of  quacks  and  false 
prophets  who  seek  to  make  money  out  of  a  revival  of  the  barbaric  superstitions 
still  prevalent  among  certain  classes  of  negroes. 

On  one  occasion  a  huge  negro  created  quite  a  clamor  among  the  blacks  in 
Petersburg,  by  announcing  that  he  could  cure  any  one  afflicted  with  disease.  He 
practically  revived  many  of  the  features  of  Voudouism,  and  was  rapidly  fleecing 
his  victims,  when  a  pitying  white  man  interposed  and  tried  to  expose  the  swindler. 


NEGRO      WITCHCRAFT. 


587 


But  it  was  of  no  avail.  The  quack  boldly  challenged  the  would-be  exposer  to 
witness  a  cure  of  a  long  standing  case  of  dropsy.  At  the  house  of  the  sick 
man  the  incredulous  Caucasian  found  a  large  crowd  of  faithful  believers  assembled 
in  front  of  a  circle  of  bones,  old  rags,  and  other  trash,  over  which  the  quack  was 
muttering  some  gibberish.  Finally  the  announcement  was  made  that  there  was 
something  in  the  sick  man's  bed  which  had  made  him  ill ;  and,  after  a  little 
search,  a  mysterious  packet  was  found  beneath  the  mattress. 

While  the  horror-stricken  crowd  were  bewailing  this  evidence  of  witchcraft, 
the  white  man  insisted  on  opening  the  packet,  found  it  filled  with  harmless  herbs 
and  minerals,  and  endeavored  to  convince  the  negroes  that  the  doctor's  confed- 
erate had  undoubtedly  concealed  it  there.  But  they  would  not  believe  him,  and 
insisted  on  considering  the  doctor  great  at  divination,  although  their  confidence 
was  a  little  shaken  when  the  man  stricken  with  dropsy  died,  despite  the  discovery 
and  removal  of  the  hurtful  charm. 


A  Queer  Cavalier. 


38 


LXV. 


THE     DISMAL     SWAMP  —  NORFOLK — THE     COAST. 

CITY  POINT,  the  historic  peninsula  upon  the  winding  James  river,  is 
connected  with  Petersburg  by  a  branch  of  the  Atlantic,  Mississippi 
and  Ohio  railroad,  and  steamers  come  up  from  the  coast  to  carry  away  coal 
and  iron.  The  route  from  Petersburg  to  Norfolk  lies  through  Prince  George, 
Sussex,  Southampton,  Isle  of  Wight,  Nansemond  and  Norfolk  counties.  General 
Mahone's  splendidly-constructed  railway  runs  in  a  perfect  air  line  for  at  least 
seventy-five  of  the  eighty- one  miles  between  the  two  cities,  and  is  in  all  respects 
a  model  highway    to  so    important  a  port  as    Norfolk.     It  takes  the  traveler 


City  Point,  Virginia. 

through  fine  cotton  -  fields ;  then  along 
stretches  of  plain  covered  with  thin 
swaying  pines ;  now  through  clearings 
where  rows  of  cabins  are  erected,  and  stalwart  negroes  are  hewing  wood  and 
digging  drains  ;  now  into  thickets  through  which  rough  roads  lead  to  some 
remote  plantation ;  now  through  smart  little  villages,  until  at  last  he  reaches 
Suffolk,  the  pretty  shire  town  of  Nansemond  county.  Suffolk  is  energetic,  and 
well  supplied  with  railways  and  river  navigation ;  manufactories  are  springing 
up;  the  Sea-board  and  Roanoke  railway  touches  there  ;  the  county  has  about 
11,000  inhabitants,  most  of  whom  are  prosperous.  The  climate  in  that  section 
is  usually  delightful;  the  thermometer  ranges  from  22  degrees  in  winter  to  94 
degrees  in  summer,  with  seasons  long  enough  for  the  maturity  of  all  crops  ; 
and,  indeed,  the  same  land  often  produces  two  crops  in  one  season.  Cotton 
and  all  the  cereals  yield  immensely.  Many  Northern  people  and  a  large  number 
of  English  families  have  settled  in  the  vicinity. 


THE      GREAT      DISMAL      SWAMP. 


589 


In  Norfolk  county  we  entered  the  edge  of  the  Great  Dismal  Swamp,  which 
extends  far  downward  over  some  of  the  northern  portions  of  North  Carolina,  and 
is  intersected  by  canals,  on  which  there  is  quite  an  extensive  transportation  busi- 
ness. The  "  swamp  "  is  a  succession  of  wild  and,  apparently,  irreclaimable 
marshes,  through  which  run 
black  currents  of  water,  and  in 
the  midst  of  which  spring  up 
thousands  of  dead  tree-trunks. 
Many  of  these  trunks  are  char- 
red or  blackened  by  the  prog- 
ress of  some  recent  fire.  Some 
are  fantastically  shaped,  and 
have  been  imagined  to  bear 
resemblance  to  well-known 
statues.  The  passer-by  has  his 
attention  invited  to  the  "Column 
Vendome." 

For  miles  the  eye  encounters 
nothing  save  the  bewildering 
stretch  of  swamp  and  dead  trees, 
or  the  dreary  country  covered 
with  rank  growth  of  pines  and 
underbrush.  The  only  signs  of 
life  are  occasional  groups  of 
negroes  about  some  saw-mill,  on 
a  "hummock,"  or  a  glimpse  of 
dusky  forms  on  a  barge  float- 
ing along  one  of  the  Stygian 
canals,  as  the  train  glides 
smoothly  and  swiftly  by.  Drummond's  Lake,  penetrated  by  a  feeder  from 
the  "  Dismal  Swamp  "  canal,  is  about  thirty  miles  long. 

Norfolk  has  a  real  English  aspect.  It  is  like  some  of  the  venerable  towns 
along  the  southern  coast  of  England,  and  the  illusion  to  which  the  traveler 
readily  yields  is  heightened  by  the  appearance  of  many  English  names  on  the 
street  corners,  over  the  doors  of  some  business  houses,  and  at  almost  every  turn. 
The  grand  current  of  the  Elizabeth  (opposite  Fort  Norfolk)  is  so  broad  and  deep 
that  the  largest  ship  that  floats  can  swing  around  there.  Midstream,  there  is 
much  clatter  and  activity ;  ships  and  steamers  arrive  and  depart,  and  the  hoarse 
shout  of  the  sailor  is  heard  all  day  long,  vying  in  strength  with  the  scream  of 
the  steamboat  whistle.  In  the  streets  remote  from  the  water-side,  not  so  much 
activity  is  apparent,  but  there  are  long  rows  of  staid,  comfortable-looking  houses, 
embowered  in  trees,  many  fine  churches,  and  an  ambitious  custom-house.  The 
trains  of  the  Atlantic,  Mississippi  and  Ohio  railroad  discharge  their  freights  of 
cotton  and  grain  directly  upon  wharves  at  the  steamers'  sides,  and  the  unusual 
facilities  are  yearly  increased  and  improved. 


A  Peep  into  the  Great  Dismal  Swamp. 


590  Norfolk's    importance    as    a    port. 

The  people  of  Norfolk  are  beginning  to  understand  the  consolidation  policy 
in  railroad  matters  now-a-days.  Time  was  when  they  could  hardly  perceive 
the  advantages  of  a  road  laid  through  the  treacherous  "hummocks"  of  the 
Dismal  Swamp,  and  they  called  the  iron  bridge  over  the  Elizabeth  "  Mahone's 
Folly  "  when  it  was  first  built,  thinking  that  it  would  cripple  the  line.  But  now 
that  they  have  grappled  hold  of  the  commerce  of  the  West,  and  have  begun  to 
compare  their  advantages  with  those  of  New  York,  they  cannot  enough  praise 
the  sagacity  of  those  who  labored  until  the  great  through  line  was  an  accom- 
plished fact. 

The  importance  of  Norfolk  as  a  port  of  the  future  is  certainly  indisputable  ; 
and  it  is  not  at  all  improbable  that  within  a  few  years  it  will  have  direct  com- 
munication with  European  ports,  by  means  of  ocean  steamers,  owned  and 
controlled  in  this  country.  The  Norfolk  people  have  made  an  effort  to  turn  the 
European  emigration,  bound  to  Texas,  through  their  town,  forwarding  it  over  the 
lines  penetrating  South-western  Virginia  and  Tennessee.  But,  thus  far,  only  a 
fortnightly  steamer  of  the  Allan  Line  has  touched  at  Norfolk,  bringing,  usually, 
many  English  families  for  the  lands  around  Charlottesville  and  Gordonsville. 
The  Elizabeth  river  is  not  so  lively  now  as  when,  at  the  beginning  of  this 
century,  the  river  could  not  be  seen,  so  thick  was  the  shipping  between  the 
Norfolk  and  Portsmouth  shores.  In  the  financial  crash  which  came  at  that 
time,  sixty  Norfolk  firms  interested  in  maritime  commerce  failed ;  the  modern 
town  does  not  boast  as  many. 

Norfolk*  lies  within  thirty-two  miles  of  the  Atlantic.  Northward  stretch 
the  Chesapeake  and  its  tributaries,  navigable  nearly  a  thousand  miles  ;  west- 
ward is  the  James,  giving  communication  with  Richmond,  and  five  hundred 
miles  of  water-way  ;  southward  run  the  canals  to  Currituck,  Albemarle  and 
Pamlico,  communicating  with  two  thousand  miles  of  river-channel.      She  affords 

*  The  eastern  and  southern  branches  of  the  Elizabeth  river  are  superior  in  depth  to  the 
Thames  at  London,  or  the  Mersey  at  Liverpool.  The  depth  of  water  in  the  harbor  at  Norfolk 
is  twenty-eight  feet,  or  nearly  twice  that  regularly  maintained  at  New  Orleans ;  and  the  harbor 
is  spacious  enough  to  admit  the  commercial  marine  of  the  whole  country.  It  has  been  estimated 
that  thirty  miles  of  excellent  water-front  for  wharfage  can  readily  be  afforded. 

Eastern  North  Carolina  is  the  natural  ally  of  Norfolk  in  commerce.  Behind  the  barrier  of 
sand-hills,  extending  along  the  Carolina  coast,  lies  one  of  the  most  fertile  regions  on  the  conti- 
nent, which  can  find  no  more  convenient  outlet  than  Norfolk.  The  Sea-board  and  Roanoke 
railroad  penetrates  North  Carolina,  a  little  above  the  point  at  which  the  trade  becomes  tributary 
to  its  canals,  and  connects  with  the  Raleigh  and  Gaston,  and  Wilmington  and  Weldon  railroads, 
at  Weldon.  The  Norfolk  and  Great  Western  road  is  a  projected  route  to  run  through  the  southern 
counties  of  Virginia,  touching  at  Danville  and  terminating  at  Bristol.  The  natural  seaport  of 
the  Chesapeake  and  Ohio  railroad,  which,  coming  from  the  Ohio  river,  penetrates  the  mountains 
of  Western  Virginia,  is,  of  course,  Norfolk.  The  Albemarle  and  Chesapeake  canal,  through 
which,  during  eleven  years  from  the  30th  of  September,  i860,  more  than  thirty-five  thousand 
vessels  of  all  classes  passed,  penetrates  a  country  rich  in  cereals,  woods,  and  naval  stores,  all  of 
which  it  brings  directly  to  Norfolk.  The  river  lines  of  steamers,  running  to  Yorktown,  Hampton, 
and  Old  Point,  Elizabeth  City,  and  Washington,  N.  C,  Roanoke  Island,  and  other  places,  are 
rapidly  re-establishing  the  local  trade  of  the  Chesapeake  and  its  tributaries,  interrupted  by  the 
war.  The  receipts  of  cotton  at  Norfolk  in  1858  were  6,174  bales;  we  have  seen  that  in  1872 
they  were  more  than  400,000. 


NORFOLK    S      CARRYING     TRADE, 


591 


'M 


naturally    the    best    seaport    for    most    of 
North    Carolina  and  Tennessee,   besides 
large    sections    of   Northern    Georgia, 
Alabama,    Mississippi,    and    the     South- 
west.     A    thorough   system    of  internal 
improvements    in   Virginia,    giving    lines 
leading  from  tide -water   in  that  State    to 
the  North-west,  would    enable  Norfolk 
almost    to    usurp    the    commercial    pre- 
eminence of  New  York.     Pittsburg,  and 
Wheeling,  and  Toledo  are  geographically 
nearer'  the    Capes    of    Virginia    than  to 
Sandy   Hook;    and    it  is  almost  certain 
that  in  the  future  many  of  the  highways 
to  the  sea  from  the  West  will  run  through 
Virginia,  and  the  ports  furnishing   outlets 
to    the  Western    cities    will    be    along    the 
beautiful   and   capacious    Chesapeake    bay. 
Ingenious  minds  have  already  mapped  an 
•|    ocean  route  from  Norfolk  to  the  Holland 
£    coast — one  possessing  great  advantages — 
s    and    it    is     to     be     hoped     that    a     com- 
o    pany   may   be    formed    to    place    steamers 
■s    upon  it. 

i.  There  are    good   steamship  lines  be- 

5  tween  Norfolk  and  New  York,  Boston, 
*  Baltimore,  and  Philadelphia.  The  Bos- 
ton steamers  carry  a  great  deal  of  cotton 
to  the  New  England  factories.  Norfolk 
received  in  1873  four  hundred  and  six 
thousand  bales  of  cotton,  an  enormous 
increase  over  her  receipts  in  1872.  The 
amount  brought  by  the  Atlantic,  Missis- 
sippi and  Ohio  railroad  alone  in  1873  was 
158,000  bales.  The  produce  business  of 
the  port  is  very  great ;  during  the  active 
season  a  daily  steamer  is  sent  to  New 
York,  Boston,  and  Baltimore,  and  three 
weekly  to  Philadelphia.  The  "truck 
farms" — i.  e.,  the  market  gardens  in  the 
vicinity, — give  the  shippers  business  at 
a  time  when  "all  cotton"  towns  are 
afflicted  with  dullness.  The  receipts  of 
truck  for  1872  amounted  to  $3,500,000; 
and    the   value    of  all  the    receipts    was 


592  A      PROMENADE      ALONG      ELIZABETH      RIVER. 

$21,000,000.*  The  duties  on  imports  into  the  district  of  Norfolk  and  Ports- 
mouth, from   1866  to   1 87 1   inclusive,  amounted  to  more  than  $800,000. 

There  is  a  large  negro  population  in  Norfolk,  and  the  white  citizens  make 
great  struggles  at  each  election  to  keep  the  municipal  power  in  their  own  hands. 
They  have  long  had  excellent  free  schools,  on  which  they  are  now  expending 
$10,000  yearly;  their  city  affairs  are  in  good  condition.  The  estimated  real 
value  of  assessable  property  in  the  city  is  $17,000,000,  and  the  greater  part  of 
the  tax  thereon  is  readily  collected ;  the  citizens  have  built  fine  water- works  at  a 
large  expense ;  the  shops  are  excellent ;  society  is  exceedingly  frank,  cordial  and 
refined. 

This  goodly  ancient  town,  with  its  20,000  inhabitants,  was  laid  out  more  than 
a  century  and  a-half  ago,  but  the  British  burned  it  in  the  Revolution,  and  it  had 
to  grow  again.  It  has  seen  troublous  times  since  then.  The  yellow  fever  has 
made  one  or  two  ghastly  visitations,  and  war  has  disturbed  the  even  tenor  of  its 
way.  There  came  a  day,  too,  when  Portsmouth,  the  pleasant  town  just  across 
the  Elizabeth  from  Norfolk,  and  where  one  of  the  principal  naval  depots  of  the 
United  States  is  situated,  seemed  enveloped  in  flame,  and  when  the  new-made 
Confederate  on  one  side  of  the  stream  watched  with  mingled  regret  and  exulta- 
tion the  burning  of  the  vast  ship-houses  and  the  ships-of-war  which  the  United 
States  were  unwilling  to  allow  him  to  capture. 

A  promenade  along  the  Elizabeth,  in  company  with  an  ex- Confederate 
officer,  was  fruitful  of  souvenirs.  It  was  toward  sunset  of  a  September  day 
when  we  clambered  upon  the  parapet  of  old  Fort  Norfolk,  and  gazed  out  over 
the  broad  expanse  of  sparkling  water  toward  the  horizon,  delicately  bordered 
with  foliage,  which  masked  the  embouchure  of  the  James,  and  the  black  spots 
further  down,  indicating  Crany  Island  and  the  entrance  to  Hampton  Roads,  where 
those  two  sea-devils,  the  "Merrimac"  and  the  "Monitor,"  had  their  fierce  battle. 
Fort  Norfolk  is  now,  as  it  was  when  the  Confederates  seized  it,  a  magazine.  The 
powder  captured  there  at  the  beginning  of  the  war  long  defended  many  a 
Southern  town. 

From  the  quaint  walls  of  the  venerable  fort  we  saw  pretty  villages  and  villas, 
and  the  noble  United  States  Marine  Hospital,  on  the  opposite  shore;  could  watch 
the  schooners  coming  in  with  the  tide,  as  the  sunset  deepened  from  blood-red 
until  it  mingled  its  last  gleam  with  the  strange  neutral  twilight;  the  sudden 
advent  of  a  Baltimore  steamer  looming  up  like  a  spectre,  with  its  dark  sides  and 
black  wheels  half- shrouded  in  smoke ;    could  see  the  rows  of  mansions  extending 

*  Some  idea  of  the  produce  business  may  be  had  from  the  following  enumeration  of  the 
articles  which  passed  through  Norfolk,  bound  mainly  to  Northern  cities,  in  1872,  and  the 
various  articles  received  at  the  port.  The  receipts  of  corn  were  1,628,940  bushels;  of  peanuts, 
544,025  bushels ;  of  dried  fruit,  346,542;  oats,  329,110;  peas,  152,420;  wheat,  75,210;  flour, 
100,640  barrels;  rosin,  129,586 barrels;  turpentine,  14,940  barrels  ;  pitch,  3,240  barrels;  tobacco, 
3,525  hogsheads,  2,520  tierces,  34,270  cases,  and  38,920  boxes.  In  the  same  time,  1,000,000 
dozens  of  eggs;  14,280,170  pounds  of  rags;  $175,000  worth  of  shad;  6,000,000  bushels  of 
oysters,  amounting  to  nearly  $4,000,000;  37,775  barrels  of  salt  fish;  8,381,860  staves,  53,392,221 
shingles,  and  57,496,290  feet  of  lumber  were  also  received.  '  The  Sea-board  and  Roanoke  rail- 
road annually  brings  in  more  than  180,000  bales  of  cotton. 


STROLLING      ABOUT      NORFOLK. 


593 


out  to  the  very  water's  edge,  and  the  piers  jutting  from  their  front  doors,  with 
rustic  arbors  and  awnings,  where  one  might  sit  and  woo  the  fresh  sea-breeze; 
could  see  the  gracefully  tapering  masts,  and  the  massive  walls  of  the  warehouses, 
and  could  hear  the  rattling  of  the  chains,  and  singing  of  sailors. 

Strolling  back,  we  noted  the  barelegged  negro  boys  sculling  in  the  skiffs 
which  they  had  half-filled  with  oysters,  and  passed  through  streets  entirely  devoted 
to  the  establishments  where  the  bivalve,  torn  from  his  shell,  was  packed  in  cans 
and  stored  to  await  his  journey  to  the  far  West.  Driving  on  the  hard  shell  road, 
later  in  the  evening,  we  passed  long  trains  of  fish-carts,  in  each  of  which  lay  a 


Map  of  the  Virginia  Peninsula. 

sleepy  negro,  growling  if  we  asked  one- half  of  the  road ;  saw  the  fields  where, 
during  the  civil  war,  the  Confederates  had  prepared  to  defend  Norfolk  from  ap- 
proach of  the  blue-coated  soldiery  by  land — fields  occupied  by  carefully-tilled 
farms,  near  which  were  the  cabin  and  garden  patch  of  the  freedman;  saw  evidences 
on  every  hand  of  growth  and  progress,  and  found  it  hard,  indeed,  to  convince 
ourselves  that  half  a  century  had  not  passed  since  the  "war  for  the  Union" 
closed. 

The  map  given  above  shows  the  configuration  of  the  Virginia  peninsula,  and 
the  location  of  Hampton  Roads,  one  of  the  most  superb  expanses  of  land-locked 
water  in  the  world.  This  grand  refuge,  in  which  all  the  navies  of  the  world 
might  at  one  time  find  shelter  from  storm,  is  but  fifteen  miles  from  Norfolk. 
Entering  from  the  Atlantic,  between  the  two  capes  of  Virginia,  Charles  and 


594 


HAMPTON      ROADS, 


Henry,  the  ships  of  Newport,  Smith,  and  Gosnold,  the  daring  English  explorers 
and  colonists,  penetrated  more  than  two  and  a-half  centuries  ago  to  Hampton 
Roads  and  anchored  opposite  the  point  now  known  as  Newport  News.  North- 
ward from  Old  Point  Comfort,  stretches  the  mighty  Chesapeake  bay,  along  whose 
richly-indented  shores  are  some  of  the  finest  harbors  on  the  American  coast. 


Hampton  Roads. 

Hampton  Roads  and  Lynnhorn  bay,  lying  between  the  capes,  and  under  their 
shelter,  are  sometimes  called  the  "Spit  Head"  and  the  "Downs"  of  the  United 
States.  The  York,  the  Potomac,  the  Rappahannock  and  the  James  rivers  empty 
their  ample  currents  into  the  Chesapeake  bay,  which  the  Virginians  claim  as 
"Virginia  water,"  because  it  passes  through  her  borders  to  the  sea,  and  flows  to 
it  between  the  capes. 

The  "northern  neck"  of  Virginia  is  that  portion  of  her  territory  situated 
between  the  Rappahannock  and  the  James  rivers,  and  extending  from  the  Chesa- 
peake bay  to  the  Blue  Ridge  mountains.  The  four  counties  in  this  section,  Lan- 
caster, Northumberland,  Richmond  and  Westmoreland,  contain  four  hundred 
and  sixty-six  thousand  acres,  on  which  only  26,000  people  are  settled.  Along 
the  rivers  and  the  bay  there  are  beautiful  plains,  which  run  back  some  two 
miles  to  a  ridge  two  hundred  feet  higher  than  the  shores.  This  ridge  extends 
throughout  the  length  of  the  neck,  and  is  intersected  every  few  miles  by  streams 
of  soft,  fresh  water.  Many  of  these  streams  are  navigable,  and  producers  settled 
along  their  banks  can  have  easy  water  communication  with  the  principal  Northern 
ports.  The  prodigal  abundance  of  food  to  be  had  with  very  little  effort,  has  thus 
far  been  an  effectual  hindrance  to  the  proper  development  of  this  favored  region ; 
the  negroes,  who  constitute  a  good  part  of  the  population,  spend  a  few  hours 


THE      NECK — THE      TIDE-WATER      REGION.  595 

of  each  day  in  securing  the  fish,  oysters,  and  wild  fowl  with  which  the  inlets 
abound,  but  do  not  possess  sufficient  ambition  to  become  either  fruit- raisers, 
market  gardeners  or  oystermen.  If  they  would  work  they  might  be  prosperous; 
but  they  prefer  a  life  of  idleness. 

The  soil  of  the  Neck  along  the  rivers  is  mainly  composed  of  alluvial  deposits. 
It  was  for  years  cultivated  recklessly,  and  very  seriously  exhausted,  under  the 
regime  of  the  slave-holder;  yet  to-day,  without  thorough  culture,  produces 
paying  crops.  The  climate  is  delightful ;  the  winters  are  very  short  and  by 
no  means  severe.  Almost  all  varieties  of  fruit,  save  those  peculiar  to  the  tropics, 
can  be  cultivated  to  perfection  there.  Labor  is  cheap ;  the  negro  is,  of  course, 
the  only  workman,  and  does  as  well  as  his  limited  knowledge  and  indolent  dis- 
position will  allow.  He  needs  the  example  of  ambitious  immigrants  to  encourage 
him  to  a  right  development  of  the  excellent  resources  so  lavishly  scattered 
around  him.  The  white  inhabitants  eagerly  welcome  skilled  workers,  and  offer 
them  lands  on  favorable  terms. 

The  tide- water  region  of  Virginia  extends  from  the  coast  to  an  imaginary 
line  drawn  across  the  State,  and  touching  at  Fredericksburg,  Richmond,  and 
Petersburg.  It  includes  the  northern  neck  just  described,  and  consists  of  a  series 
of  peninsulas  whose  sides  are  washed  by  the  Chesapeake  bay,  and  the  great 
tidal  rivers  emptying  into  it.  Throughout  this  section  the  principal  item  of  land 
culture  is  market  gardening;  good  farms  are  to  be  had  for  small  prices.  The 
lands  are  well  drained ;  reasonably  free  from  marsh,  with  a  soil  of  clay,  marl 
and  sand,  and  an  overgrowth  of  pine  and  oak.  It  is  estimated  that  30,000,000 
bushels  of  oysters  are  annually  drawn  from  the  waters  in  this  region ;  a  State 
tax  is  collected  yearly  on  20,000,000  bushels.  Malarial  fevers  are  the  draw- 
back, and  historical  memorials  are  the  boast  of  the  section.  Fevers  prevail 
only  during  the  autumn  months,  and  will  doubtless  disappear  entirely  as  the 
country  becomes  more  densely  populated,  and  sufficient  attention  is  given  to 
drainage.  They  are  at  present  the  curse  of  the  river-side  populations,  and  nothing 
is  more  common  than  to  meet  a  lean,  discolored  individual  who  explains  his  woe- 
begone look  by  announcing  that  he  has  just  had  a  "  right  smart  shake." 


LXVI. 

THE       EDUCATION       OF       NEGROES — THE       AMERICAN       MISSIONARY 
ASSOCIATION  —  THE     PEABODY    FUND — THE    CIVIL    RIGHTS    BILL. 

AT  Hampton  one  begins  to  appreciate  the  magnitude  of  the  revolution 
which  has  overtaken  the  South.  There  it  was  that,  more  than  two 
hundred  and  fifty  years  ago,  the  first  cargo  of  slaves  was  landed  on  American 
soil.  There  the  curse  began,  and  there  its  bitter  leaven  worked  until  the  time  of 
deliverance  arrived,  and  it  was  ordained  that,  on  the  very  ground  where  the  negro 
had  first  been  enslaved  by  the  white  man  in  Virginia,  efforts  for  his  elevation  to 
a  true  manhood  should  be  undertaken. 

Everywhere  that  the  Union  armies  went  in  the  South,  they  found  the  negro 
anxious  for  knowledge.  The  wretched  slave  was  like  a  blind  man  who  heard 
around  him  tumult  and  struggle,  and  who  constantly  cried  aloud  for  light,  for 
the  power  of  vision.  He  was  weighted  down  with  the  crushing  burden  of  his 
past  life ;  he  saw  the  great  chance  slipping  away  from  him,  and  in  his  intense 
desire  to  become  intelligent  and  independent,  he  fairly  laid  hold  upon  the  soldiery 
for  help.  But  the  officers  and  men  of  the  army  knew  not  what  to  do  with  the 
negroes  who  took  refuge  in  the  Union  camps.  Sometimes  they  sent  them  back 
to  their  masters ;  at  others  they  protected  and  fed  them,  while  at  the  same  time 
denying  any  intention  of  interfering  with  the  institution  of  slavery. 

But  the  day  came  when  General  Butler  pronounced  the  freedmen  who,  by 
thousands,  had  flocked  into  the  country  around  Fortress  Monroe,  "  contraband  of 
war."  Hungry,  homeless,  and  filled  with  nameless  dread,  these  rude  exiles  from 
the  plantations  of  their  late  masters  turned  toward  the  National  Government, 
and  held  out  their  hands  for  protection.  They  knew  not  what  to  do.  The 
future  lay  dark  before  them.  The  cannon  still  thundered  throughout  Virginia. 
The  negroes  stood  on  the  threshold  of  liberty,  still  fearing  that  they  might  be 
dragged  away  to  their  old  condition  of  servitude.  The  country  came  to  their 
aid.  The  National  Government  found  the  key-note  of  the  situation  in  Butler's 
sharp,  coarse  proclamation,  and  held  the  negro  refugees  under  its  protection. 
Then  the  American  Missionary  Association  came  to  the  front. 

This  noble  Association,  for  so  many  years  before  the  war  an  earnest  worker 
in  the  antislavery  cause,  was  ready  and  anxious  to  send  material  relief  to  the 
negroes.  It  was  willing  to  aid  in  feeding  their  bodies  as  well  as  their  souls.  It 
had  had  its  missionaries  in  all  parts  of  the  South,  undergoing  persecution  and 
abuse  for  the  sake  of  preaching  the  gospel  and  telling  the  truth.  Its  envoys  had 
been  driven  out  of  some  of  the  States ;  others,  as  the  outbreak  of  the  war 
approached,  were  arrested  and  imprisoned.     But  the  work  went  on  ! 


ASSOCIATIONS      FOR      TEACHING      FREEDMEN.  597 

In  August  of  1 86 1,  Lewis  Tappan,  Esq.,  then  Treasurer  of  the  American 
Missionary  Association,  wrote  to  General  Butler,  at  Fortress  Monroe,  asking 
what  could  be  done  to  aid  the  negroes.  The  General  answered,  showing  the 
unhappy  condition  of  the  freedmen  and  women,  and  welcoming  any  assistance. 
Letters  came  from  soldiers  and  officers  in  the  army  to  the  charitable  throughout 
New  York  and  the  East,  asking  help  for  the  negroes.  Rev.  L.  C.  Lockwood  was 
sent  out  to  investigate  the  condition  of  the  great  mass  of  refugees  in  Virginia, 
and  in  September  he  opened  a  Sabbath  school  in  the  deserted  mansion  of  ex- 
President  Tyler.  On  the  1 7th  day  of  the  same  month,  he  started  the  first  day 
school  for  the  freedmen.  It  was  held  in  an  humble  house  not  far  from  Fortress 
Monroe,  and  was  taught  by  Mary  A.  Peake,  an  excellent  woman,  whose  father 
was  an  Englishman  of  rank  and  culture,  but  whose  mother  was  a  free  colored 
woman.  She,  the  representative  of  both  the  oppressing  and  oppressed  races, 
began  her  work  of  regeneration  of  the  blacks  on  the  very  coast  where  the 
degradation  began,  and  near  a  proud  seminary  where  the  daughters  of  Southern 
aristocrats  had  received  the  education  paid  for  by  the  unrequited  labor  of  slaves. 

As  the  war  progressed,  the  work  of  teaching  grew  and  strengthened  among 
the  freedmen.  The  Union  forces  made  their  way  on  to  the  sea- islands  along  the 
South  Carolina  coast  in  November  of  1861,  and  the  usual  swarms  of  ignorant 
and  half-starved  negroes  flocked  around  them.  The  envoys  sent  from  the  North 
to  examine  into  the  condition  of  these  wretched  people  gave  such  thrilling 
accounts  of  their  needs,  that  public  meetings  to  devise  measures  for  relief  were 
held  in  Boston,  New  York,  and  Philadelphia.  Societies  for  the  establishment  of 
schools  and  forwarding  of  supplies  were  speedily  formed ;  the  "  Boston  Education 
Society,"  the  "Freedmen's  Relief  Association  "  of  New  York,  and  others,  sprang 
into  existence  early  in  1862.  Men  and  women  were  at  once  sent  out  as  teachers. 
They  began  by  first  relieving  the  physical  wants  of  the  distressed,  and  then  tried 
to  teach  them  the  dignity  of  labor.  The  "  Port  Royal  Society"  of  Philadelphia 
sent  funds,  provisions,  and  teachers.  Cincinnati,  Chicago,  Cleveland  and  Pittsburg 
sent  workers  and  money.  Societies  multiplied  so  rapidly  that  it  was  finally 
deemed  advisable  to  consolidate  them;  and  it  was  accordingly  done  in  1866,  the 
combined  bodies  taking  the  title  of  the  "American  Freedmen's  Union  Commis- 
sion." This  colossal  organization  worked  in  perfect  harmony  with  the  American 
Missionary  Association  for  a  short  time,  then  gradually  withdrew  some  of  its 
branches  from  the  work  as  reconstruction  progressed,  and  ceased  to  be  a  really 
national  body. 

From  the  date  of  the  founding  of  the  school  near  Fortress  Monroe,  the 
American  Missionary  Association  pushed  its  work  with  exemplary  vigor.  The 
opening  of  1863  brought  with  it  the  proclamation  of  emancipation,  and  settled 
forever  the  question  of  the  condition  of  negro  fugitives  who  escaped  to  the  Union 
lines.  Then  the  North  put  forth  its  strength.  Hundreds  of  refined  and  delicate 
ladies  voluntarily  engaged  in  the  work  of  teaching  the  blacks — living  amid  cheer- 
less surroundings,  on  poor  fare,  and  meeting  with  contempt  and  vulgar  ostracism, 
which  many  a  one  who  was  guilty  of  it  then  would  to-day  be  ashamed  of.  At 
Hampton,  Norfolk,  and  Portsmouth,  day  and  Sabbath  schools  for  the  negroes 


598  TEACHERS THE      FREEDMEN'S      BUREAU. 

were  held  in  the  colored  churches  ;  evening  schools  for  adults  were  established, 
and  men  and  women  nocked  to  them  after  the  fatigues  of  the  day.  On  the 
estate  of  ex- Governor  Wise,  of  Virginia,  near  Norfolk,  the  Missionary  Associa- 
tion established  schools,  and  the  Governor's  mansion  became  a  school  and  a 
home  for  colored  teachers. 

Wherever  the  freed  negroes  gathered,  as  at  Newbern  in  North  Carolina, 
at  Nashville  in  Tennessee,  on  Roanoke  Island,  in  the  Port  Royal  Islands,  at 
Vicksburg,  at  Columbus,  at  Memphis,  at  President  Island,  at  Camps  Fisk  and 
Shiloh,  teachers  were  furnished,  charities  were  bestowed,  and  the  good  work 
went  nobly  on.  In  1864  the  Association's  workers  in  the  field  of  the  South 
numbered  250,  mainly  employed  in  Virginia  and  along  the  line  of  the  Mississippi. 
In  Louisiana  General  Banks  had  introduced  an  efficient  system  of  public  instruc- 
tion, supported  by  a  military  tax,  and  there,  too,  the  Association  sent  its  teachers. 
The  colored  troops  enlisted  in  the  Union  armies  were  instructed,  and  while  the 
negroes  rested  from  drill,  they  pored  over  the  Readers  and  text-books  which  had 
been  distributed  among  them. 

The  bodily  needs  of  the  freedmen  were  always  as  great  and  extreme  as  their 
spiritual  necessities.  Thousands  died  of  neglect  and  starvation.  The  hand  of 
Northern  charity  could  not  reach  one-third  of  the  sufferers.  Many  died  under 
the  despair  and  unrest  occasioned  by  their  change  of  condition.  They  became 
wanderers,  and  set  out  upon  long  journeys  hither  and  yon,  blindly  straying  toward 
some  dimly- defined  goal.  Their  darkened  minds  were  impressed  with  the  belief 
that  somewhere  a  great  material  heritage  awaited  them.  They  were  in  an-  atti- 
tude of  intense  suspense  when  the  war  ended.  Virtually  the  wards  of  the 
National  Government,  which  had  been  compelled  to  undertake  their  support 
wherever  they  claimed  aid,  they  relied  implicitly  upon  the  promises  given  them. 
Unable  to  help  themselves,  or  to  understand  the  dignity  of  the  future  to  which 
they  had  suddenly  been  introduced,  they  could  but  hope  and  wait. 

Behind  the  army  of  Sherman,  and  the  forces  which  entered  Richmond, 
marched  resolute  teachers.  Schools  were  established  in  the  slave-marts  of 
Savannah,  and  were  in  due  time  placed  under  the  control  of  the  American 
Missionary  Association.  In  Augusta,  in  Charleston,  in  Wilmington,  and  Rich- 
mond, teachers  did  all  they  could  to  shape  the  minds  of  the  negroes  to  a  sense 
of  the  responsibilities  of  manhood  and  the  dignity  of  womanhood.  Early  in 
March  of  1865  the  Freedmen's  Bureau  was  formed,  and  placed  under  the  direc- 
tion of  General  O.  O.  Howard,  who,  as  its  chief  commissioner,  did  much  to  aid 
the  colored  man  in  maintaining  his  rights.  The  Bureau  established  schools 
wisely  and  well ;  and  under  its  fostering  care  many  now  prosperous  institutions 
were  started  and  maintained,  until  they  showed  their  beneficent  character,  and 
received  large  support  from  private  charities. 

As  the  Missionary  Association  had  been  from  the  first  frankly  unsectarian, 
it  from  time  to  time  received  the  cordial  cooperation  of  the  different  churches. 
The  Wesleyan  Methodists  went  into  its  work  with  the  fervor  which  characterizes 
all  their  movements.  The  Free-Will  Baptists  supported  many  of  its  teachers. 
The  National  Council  of  Congregational  Churches,  which  assembled  in  Boston 


DONATIONS THE  PEABODY   FUND.  599 

in  June  of  1865,  recommended  the  raising  of  a  quarter  of  a  million  of  dollars, 
to  be  placed  in  the  hands  of  the  Missionary  Association,  for  carrying  on  the 
work  among  the  freedmen.  This  generous  gift  came  into  play  in  1866,  and 
orphan  asylums  and  normal  schools  were  founded.  The  first  asylum  was 
located  at  Wilmington  in  North  Carolina;  the  second,  founded  by  a  donation 
from  Hon.  I.  Washburn  of  Worcester,  Massachusetts,  at  Atlanta,  Georgia. 

Aid  from  abroad  meantime  came  generously  in.  Great  Britain  sent  more 
than  $1,000,000.  in  money  and  clothing  to  the  freedmen.  The  envoys  of  the 
Missionary  Association  were  gladly  and  hospitably  received  in  England,  Scot- 
land and  Wales. 

With  the  advent  of  reconstruction  came  a  change  in  the  aspect  of  the  educa- 
tional situation.  The  Southern  people  were  not  satisfied  to  see  the  black  men 
elevated  to  political  power ;  and  in  many  States  the  most  barbarous  and,  in 
some  cases,  murderous  measures  of  intimidation  were  used  to  prevent  the  negro 
from  gaining  instruction,  and  from  demonstrating  his  right  to  be  a  man.  Mob 
violence,  Ku-Klux  mysteries,  and  social  ostracisms  were  tried  as  agencies  to 
deter  Northern  teachers  from  doing  their  good  work.  But  the  labor  was  con- 
tinued as  zealously  as  before.  Churches  were  founded,  the  normal  schools  were 
liberally  aided  and  encouraged  in  their  work  of  equipping  colored  teachers,  and 
wherever  one  teacher  fainted  in  the  ranks,  another  was  quickly  found  to  supply 
his  or  her  place. 

The  operation  of  the  Peabody  fund,  and  the  constant  beneficence  of  the 
wealthy  in  the  North  and  West,  are  still  doing  much  to  second  the  efforts  which  the 
Southern  people  are  now  themselves  making  in  the  cause  of  free  public  educa- 
tion. The  negroes  have  as  yet  done  but  little  to  help  themselves ;  they  are  not 
property  holders  to  any  extent,  nor  do  they  seem  likely  to  become  such,  until 
they  have  been  educated  for  at  least  a  generation.  Instances  of  thrift  and 
thorough  independence  among  them  are  not  wanting,  it  is  true ;  but  the  mass  of 
negro  males  in  the  Southern  States  aid  comparatively  little  in  paying  for  the 
school  privileges  which  they  receive,  under  the  operation  of  school  laws  in  most 
of  the  reconstructed  commonwealths. 

The  North  has  done  much ;  yet  it  is  by  no  means  a  proper  time  for  it  to 
relax  its  efforts.  There  never  was  a  period  when  the  money,  the  intelligence 
and  the  energy  of  Northern  people  were  so  much  needed  in  the  cause  of  educa- 
tion in  the  South  as  now.  There  was  never  a  time  when  so  much  real  missionary 
work  could  be  done  among  the  negroes.  Now  that  they  are  beginning  to  take 
active  part  as  citizens  in  the  affairs  of  their  sections  they  need  the  best  instruc- 
tion and  the  wisest  advice.  Their  ignorance  has  already  been  made  the  means  of 
infamous  tyranny ;  their  accession  to  political  power  has  been  marked  by  much 
injustice  and  wrong,  of  which  they  have  been  unwittingly  the  instruments;  and 
the  North  owes  it  to  them  and  to  herself  to  aid  in  rescuing  them  from  the  adven- 
turers into  whose  clutches  they  have  fallen. 

The  seven  chartered  normal  schools  which  have  grown  up  under  the  Ameri- 
can Missionary  Association  in  the  South  are  annually  equipping  fine  corps  of 
teachers  for  colored  schools.    Hampton,  in  Virginia ;  Berea  College,  on  the  border 


600  THE     NORMAL      SCHOOLS      FOR     NEGROES. 

line  between  the  blue  grass  and  the  mountain  regions  of  Kentucky ;  Fisk  Uni- 
versity, at  Nashville,  Tennessee ;  Atlanta  University,  in  Atlanta,  Georgia ;  Talla- 
dega College,  in  Alabama ;  Tougaloo  University,  in  Mississippi ;  and  Straight 
University,  in  New  Orleans,  are  but  the  precursors  of  other  similar  institutions 
to  be  placed  in  each  Southern  State.  The  Association  will  not  rest  contented 
with  its  labors  until  it  has  established  normal  schools  in  each  of  the  ex-slave 
States  west  of  the  Mississippi  river.  In  addition  to  these  normal  institutes,  the 
American  Missionary  Association  now  has  graded  and  normal  schools  combined 
in  Wilmington,  North  Carolina;  in  Charleston,  where  the  Avery  Institute  has 
more  than  four  hundred  pupils,  and  owns  twenty  thousand  dollars'  worth  of 
property;  in  Greenwood,  South  Carolina;  in  Andersonville,  Atlanta,  Macon, 
and  Savannah,  Georgia;  in  Athens,  Marion,  Mobile,  Montgomery,  and  Selma,  in 
Alabama;  in  Chattanooga  and  Memphis,  Tennessee  ;  in  Lexington  and  Louisville, 
Kentucky;  in  Columbus,  Mississippi;  in  Galveston,  Texas ;  and  in  Jefferson  City, 
Missouri.  It  has  under  its  charge,  mainly  in  the  Southern  field,  although  some 
few  of  the  institutions  are  on  the  Pacific  coast,  forty- seven  churches,  with  a 
membership  of  2,898  ;  the  seven  normal  and  nineteen  graded  and  normal  schools 
mentioned  above ;  forty-seven  common  schools ;  three  hundred  and  twenty-three 
ministers,  missionaries  and  teachers ;  and  more  than  fourteen  thousand  pupils. 
As  the  work  of  thirteen  years,  in  the  face  of  the  most  remarkable  obstacles  and 
with  a  degraded  population  born  in  slavery  to  operate  upon,  this  merits  the 
world's  applause. 

The  efforts  of  this  brave  Association  and  kindred  societies  have  not  been  in 
vain.  The  Southern  States  at  last  have  school  systems  of  their  own,  and  seem 
likely  to  maintain  them.     This  alone  is  worth  all  that  the  war  cost. 

When  Dr.  Sears,  the  able  and  generous  agent  of  the  Peabody  fund,  went 
South  in  July  of  1867,  there  was,  strictly  speaking,  no  modern  school  system  in 
any  of  the  twelve  States  in  which  the  fund  now  operates.  Tennessee  inaugurated 
one,  however,  in  that  same  year,  under  General  Eaton.  To-day  all  of  those 
twelve  States  have  by  law,  and  all  but  one  or  two  have  in  fact,  tolerable  school 
systems.  West  Virginia,  Virginia  and  Tennessee,  now  have  the  most  effective 
plans.  Tennessee,  after  originally  taking  the  lead,  nearly  abolished  its  schools 
on  changing  its  politics  three  or  four  years  ago.  It  adopted  the  miserable  county 
system,  with  no  State  Superintendent.  But  for  the  last  year  or  two,  it  has  not 
only  recovered  what  it  had  lost,  but  is  now  surpassed  in  good  'legislation  and 
general  activity  for  schools  by  no  Southern  State  unless  it  be  Virginia.  At  this 
time  it  is,  in  some  respects,  the  most  zealous  and  active  State  in  the  South  con- 
cerning educational  matters,  and  the  prospects  for  public  schools  for  years  to 
come,  at  least  in  the  large  towns,  are  most  encouraging. 

West  Virginia,  which  adopted  a  pretty  good  system  early  after  the  war,  did 
not  suffer  much  by  a  change  from  Republican  to  Democratic  politics.  The  Con- 
vention for  revising  the  Constitution  made  no  change  in  that  portion  relating  to 
schools.  The  latest  legislation,  leaving  it  optional  with  the  counties  to  supple- 
ment the  inadequate  State  taxation,  was  supposed  to  be  disastrous;  but  the 
people  have  fortunately  shown  a  disposition  to  vote  a  liberal  tax. 


PREJUDICE  —  TAXATION — MIXED    SCHOOLS.  601 

It  is  the  testimony  of  Dr.  Sears  and  other  intelligent  men,  who  have  care- 
fully studied  the  subject,  that  three  of  the  Conservative  States  are  now  leading 
all  the  others  of  the  South  in  education.  The  feeling  in  favor  of  schools  of  some 
kind  is  so  strong  that  no  ambitious  man  of  any  party,  in  any  Southern  State,  dares 
to  oppose  public  free  education.  This  is  certainly  a  radical  change  in  seven 
years  ! 

Arkansas  has  a  good  school  system,  inadequately  supported ;  Mississippi  has 
good  schools  in  the  cities,  but  very  few  in  the  country.  Alabama's  progress  is 
marred  by  unwise  legislation,  which  gives  the  Legislature  the  power  to  veto  the 
laws  that  only  a  Board  of  Education  can  pass. 

The  American  Missionary  Association,  and  all  Northern  enterprises  in  the 
cause  of  education,  cannot  do  better  for  the  next  decade  than  to  put  all  their 
money  and  talent  into  the  States  which  are  now,  and  are  likely  from  time  to  time 
to  be,  under  negro  rule.  In  South  Carolina,  Florida,  and  Louisiana,  the  white 
people  either  stand  aloof  entirely  from  many  of  the  public  schools,  or  give  them 
but  a  feeble  and  reluctant  support.  Normal  schools  and  thorough  teaching  are 
needed  bitterly  in  those  States,  and  will  be  required  for  ten  years  to  come. 

At  the  commencement  of  the  educational  work  in  the  South,  there  were 
three  grand  hindrances  to  the  establishment  of  public  schools. 

The  first  was  prejudice  against  them  as  a  Northern  institution,  not  adapted 
to  the  condition  of  the  Southern  people.  This  is  now  so  far  overcome  as  to 
cause  no  anxiety. 

The  second  was  the  burden  of  taxation ;  but  men  are  now  beginning,  all 
through  the  South,  to  see  the  necessity  and  economy  of  free  schools.  The  oppo- 
sition is  mainly,  to-day,  among  the  ignorant,  against  whom  the  enlightened  are 
gradually  prevailing. 

The  third  and  most  potent,  still  existing,  is  the  dread  of  mixed  schools. 
This  should  not  be  understood,  as  it  so  often  is  at  the  North,  as  arising  from  a 
desire  on  the  part  of  the  Southerner  to  deprive  the  negro  of  his  chances  for  an 
education.  The  objection  to  mixed  schools  is  a  graver  one,  and  may  be  con- 
sidered sufficient.  Until  the  masses  of  the  black  population  in  the  South  have 
acquired  a  higher  moral  tone  than  at  present  characterizes  them,  it  will  not 
be  well  to  admit  them  freely  into  that  communion  which  an  education  in  the 
same  rooms  and  under  the  same  teachers  as   white  children  would  give. 

It  is  noteworthy  that  where  the  negroes  have  full  and  unrestrained  political 
power,  as  in  South  Carolina  and  Louisiana,  they  have  not  even  demanded 
mixed  schools  to  any  extent.  They  know  that  it  would  be  useless ;  and  it 
would  be  quite  as  repulsive  to  most  of  the  blacks  as  to  the  whites  to  have  an 
indiscriminate  mingling  of  the  races  in  schools.  The  negro  in  the  Conserva- 
tive States  gains  many  more  educational  advantages  by  a  separate  school  sys- 
tem than  he  could  by  mixed  schools.  Although  he  rarely  pays  more  than 
one-sixth  as  much  in  taxes  as  his  white  fellow-citizen,  the  school  law  guaran- 
tees him  exactly  equal  school  facilities,  save  in  a  very  few  instances,  and 
supplies  him  with  buildings  and  teachers.  It  would  be  as  absurd  on  the  part 
of  Congress  to  pass  a  bill  a  section  of  which  should  require  the  co-education 


602  SCHOOL     STATISTICS  —  THE     DUTY      OF     CONGRESS. 

of  the  sexes  in  the  South,  as  to  enact  the  mixed  school  section  of  the  pro- 
posed "civil  rights"  bill.  The  good  sense  of  the  negroes  rejects  the  section, 
as  it  enables  them  to  see  that  a  law  odious  to  the  whites  would  have  for  its 
natural  result  a  cessation  of  effort  in  behalf  of  the  blacks.  The  mixing  of  the 
races  is  not  a  matter  for  national  legislation.  Both  races  now  have  the  vote ; 
each  has  an  equal  chance  with  the  other  to  acquire  property  and  enjoy  it;  each 
can  have  all  the  education  that  it  is  willing  to  buy,  besides  what  is  freely  given  it. 
The  course  of  a  Congress  which  seriously  discusses  the  passage  of  a  bill  which 
would  block  the  whole  educational  system  of  the  South,  and  at  the  same  time 
never  thinks  of  voting  any  appropriation  to  aid  in  carrying  on  the  work  of  edu- 
cation there,  is  certainly  open  to  criticism.  The  practical  tendency  of  the  attempt 
at  enforcement  of  the  mixed  school  clause  would  be  the  turning  out  of  doors  of 
the  million  and  a-half  of  white  and  black  children  now  in  the  public  schools  of 
the  fifteen  ex-slave  States. 

Taking  the  statistics  of  the  Southern  public  schools,  as  given  in  1871  and 
1872,  it  will  be  seen  that  seven  years  after  the  close  of  the  war  the  impoverished 
Southern  States  had  managed  to  bring  under  the  operation  of  a  school  system 
proportionally  four-sevenths  as  many  children  as  are  at  school  in  the  North,  and 
to  keep  them  at  school  three-fourths  as  long.*  In  view  of  the  fact  that  great 
numbers  of  the  Southern  people  (/.  e.,  the  negroes)  own  little  or  no  property,  it 
may  be  asserted  that  the  Southern  property  holder  is  paying  a  much  heavier 
school  tax  than  is  his  Northern  brother. 

Congress,  instead  of  threatening  the  South  with  the  destruction  of  her  school 
system,  should  take  earnest  measures  to  foster  and  protect  education  in  all  the 
Southern  States.  The  ignorance  prevalent  in  that  section  is  the  cause  of  many 
phases  of  its  unhappy  condition.  It  is  believed  that  the  registered  adult  illiter- 
ates in  the  South  constitute  more  than  one-half  the  adult  population.  There  is 
indisputable  evidence  to  show  that  the  percentage  of  illiteracy  has  increased 
among  the  whites  in  the  South  since  the  outbreak  of  the  war.  The  reclaiming 
of  the  "poor  whites"  from  the  barbarism  in  which  they  have  been  plunged  for 
so  many  years  is  certainly  a  proper  subject  for  the  consideration  of  the  National 
Government.  If  that  Government  had  carefully  and  wisely  supplemented,  by  an 
equal  sum,  such  a  generous  donation  as  the  $2,000,000  given  by  George  Peabody 
for  education  in  the  South,  it  would  have  done  no  more  than  its  duty.  The 
negroes  have  been  called  the  wards  of  the  nation;  yet  we  find  the  Southern 
States  and  a  few  individuals  and  societies  doing  all  that  is  done  for  them.  The 
nation  does  little  but  look  on. 

*  Vide  Report  of  General  Ruffner,  Virginia  Superintendent  of  Education,  for  1873. 


LXVII. 

THE       HAMPTON       NORMAL      INSTITUTE  —  GENERAL      ARMSTRONG'S 
WORK — FISK     UNIVERSITY— BEREA     AND     OTHER     COLLEGES. 

THE  better  class  of  Southerners  have  been  for  some  time  convinced  that 
they  must  help  the  negroes  to  an  education,  as  a  protective  measure. 
They  have  discovered  that  the  free  laborer  must  possess  a  certain  amount  of 
intelligence,  and  that  he  must  have  the  incentives  to  work  and  to  the  acquisition 
of  property  which  knowledge  gives.  But  the  great  difficulty  has  been  to  procure 
a  sufficient  number  of  capable  colored  instructors  for  work  throughout  the  back- 
country.  In  the  cities  white  teachers  have  been  readily  procured ;  but  in  the 
interior  those  of  their  own  race  were  needed  for  the  negroes.  To  insure  the 
elevation  of  the  blacks,  they  must  have  before  them  the  daily  example  of  one  of 
their  own  people  who  has  been  instructed,  and  who  is  anxious  to  instruct  them. 

The  establishment  of  the  normal  schools  mentioned  in  the  previous  chapter 
proved  the  solution  of  this  difficulty.  The  Northern  people,  who  had  been  the 
closest  observers  of  the  freedmen,  readily  recognized  that  the  first  need  was  the 
spread  of  rudimentary  education.  After  the  new  generation  had  been  taught  to 
read  and  write,  had  been  shown  the  dignity  of  labor,  and  had  received  the  much- 
needed  lessons  in  morality,  it  would  be  time  enough  to  found  a  college  with  a 
classical  course  for  the  freedmen,  or  to  insist  on  the  privilege  for  them  of  entrance 
into  the  colleges  now  occupied  by  the  whites.  So  the  sensible  Northerners  went 
at  the  .work  of  educating  negro  teachers. 

"What  the  negro  needs  at  once,"  wrote  General  Samuel  C.  Armstrong,  in  his 
report  on  the  system  and  condition  of  the  Hampton  Normal  Institute,  made  to 
the  Virginia  Superintendent  of  Education  in  1872,  "is  elementary  and  industrial 
education.  The  race  will  succeed  or  fail  as  it  shall  devote  itself  with  energy  to 
agriculture  and  the  mechanic  arts,  or  avoid  these  pursuits,  and  its  teachers  must 
be  inspired  with  the  spirit  of  hard  work,  and  acquainted  with  the  ways  that  lead 
to  material  success.  An  imitation  of  Northern  models  will  not  do.  Right 
methods  of  work  at  the  South  must  be  created,  not  copied,  although  the  under- 
lying principle  is  everywhere  the  same."  This  is  the  truth,  and  those  of  the 
negroes  who  have  been  taught  under  such  men  as  General  Armstrong  are  telling 
it  to  their  fellows. 

General  Armstrong,  who  had  been  Colonel  of  the  Eighth  Regiment  of  United 
States  colored  troops  during  the  war,  was  the"  chief  official  of  the  Freedmen's 
Bureau  at  Hampton  when  the  thousands  of  blacks  were  helplessly  gathered  there. 
As  early  as  1867,  he  had  set  forth,  in  an  able  article,  the  need  of  normal  schools 
for  the  colored  people.  The  son  of  a  missionary  who  was  for  sixteen  years  the 
Minister  of  Public  Instruction  in  the  Hawaiian  kingdom,  General  Armstrong  thor- 
39 


604  "HAMPTON     NORMAL     INSTITUTE" FISK      UNIVERSITY. 

oughly  understood  the  establishment  of  schools  upon  a  "manual  labor"  basis,  as 
they  had  been  established  in  the  Sandwich  Islands.  A  man  of  quick  sympathies, 
tremendous  will  and  iron  courage,  he  determined  to  see  what  the  manual  labor 
school  would  do  for  the  freedmen  and  freedwomen.  With  the  cooperation  of  the 
American  Missionary  Association,  he  began  his  work  and,  in  April  of  1868,  in- 
augurated the  labors  of  the  institution  which  was  chartered  in  1 867  by  the  Virginia 
Legislature  as  the  Hampton  Normal  and  Agricultural  Institute,  with  a  board  of 
eminent  Northern  gentlemen  as  trustees.  General  Howard,  as  head  of  the  Freed- 
men's  Bureau,  helped  the  work  generously ;  money  was  given,  a  large  farm  was 
purchased,  and  in  1872  the  school  received  its  first  aid  from  Virginia,  in  land- 
scrip  to'the  amount  of  $95,000,  bestowed  on  the  institution  in  its  character  of  agri- 
cultural college.  Thus  encouraged,  the  school  prospered,  and  colored  pupils  flocked 
to  it  from  nearly  all  the  States  of  the  South.  The  division  of  labor  and  study 
partaken  by  both  male  and  female  pupils  has  been  satisfactory  to  both  teachers 
and  scholars,  and  the  pecuniary  results  have  been  better  than  were  anticipated. 
Each  male  student  has,  each  week,  from  a  day  and  a-half  to  two  days'  labor  on 
the  farm,  for  which  he  is  credited  a  fair  sum.  The  young  women  are  provided 
with  an  industrial  department,  where  they  are  taught  to  use  sewing-machines, 
and  are  familiarized  with  all  the  ordinary  duties  of  housekeeping.  There  is  a 
printing-office  attached  to  the  school,  and  a  monthly  paper  is  issued  by  the  labor 
of  the  scholars.  One  of  the  fundamental  principles  of  the  school  is  that  nothing 
shall  be  given  which  can  be  earned  by  the  pupil,  and  this  has  the  desired  effect 
of  encouraging  a  spirit  of  independence.  Since  the  founding  of  the  institution, 
it  has  sent  out  nearly  one  hundred  well-trained  teachers,  earnest,  honest  Christian 
men  and  women,  who  propose  to  devote  their  lives  to  the  elevation  of'  their  race. 
At  the  closing  exercises  of  the  term  of  1874,  when  a  large  class  graduated, 
Virginians  and  New  Englanders  united  in  pronouncing  the  school  a  thorough 
success,  and  one  of  the  most  effective  agents  for  the  elevation  of  the  negro. 

The  normal  work  has  had  great  and  encouraging  growth  in  Tennessee.  The 
people  of  Nashville  had  the  problem  of  the  care  of  freedmen  presented  to  them 
early  in  1862,  and  in  1867  the  Freedmen's  Bureau  and  the  American  Missionary 
Association  together  had  succeeded  in  securing  the  charter  of  Fisk  University  in 
that  city.  Early  in  1867  the  State  Superintendent  of  Public  Instruction  and  other 
Tennesseans  announced  that  "the  best  way  to  permanently  establish  and  per- 
petuate schools  among  the  colored  people  is  to  establish  good  normal  training 
schools  for  the  education  of  teachers."  The  University  was  developed  ffom  the 
Fisk  school,  opened  in  1866,  and  named  for  General  Clinton  B.  Fisk,  who  was 
for  a  time  in  charge  of  the  work  of  the  Freedmen's  Bureau  at  Nashville.  The 
attendance  at  this  school  had  averaged  over  a  thousand  pupils,'  until  Nashville 
herself  adopted  a  public  school  system.  The  Missionary  Association  then  placed 
a  suitable  location  for  buildings  at  the  disposition  of  the  trustees  of  the  new 
University,  and  a  little  band  of  the  students,  young  men  and  women,  went  out 
into  the  North  to  sing  the  "  heart-songs  "  in  which  the  slaves  used  to  find  such 
consolation,"  and  by  means  of  concerts  to  secure  the  money  with  which  to  erect 
new  University  buildings.     The  success  of  that  campaign,  in  this  country  and  in 


"JUBILEE      HALL" BEREA      COLLEGE.  605 

England,  is  now  a  matter  of  history.  The  "Jubilee  Singers"  have  found  the 
means  to  build  Jubilee  Hall,  an  edifice  which  would  be  an  ornament  to  any 
university,  and  around  which  will  in  time  be  grouped  many  others. 

This  University  began  with  the  alphabet  in  1867.  It  teaches  it  still,  but  it 
offers  in  addition  a  college  classical  course  of  four  years,  with  a  preparatory 
course  of  three  years,  and  two  normal  courses  of  two  years  each.  The  following 
paragraph  from  a  report  of  a  recent  commencement  will  show  what  progress 
the  ex-slaves  have  already  made : 

"  On  Thursday  the  freshman  class  in  college  was  examined  in  Virgil's  ^Eneid,  Geometry, 
and  Botany,  the  latter  with  the  sophomores.  The  sophomore  class  was  examined  in  the  De 
Amicitia  and  De  Senectute  of  Cicero,  and  Livy,  in  Latin;  in  Homer's  Iliad,  in  Greek,  and 
Bo'tany,  in  all  of  which  the  members  of  this  class  acquitted  themselves  with  marked  ability, 
showing  conclusively  that  the  people  of  the  colored  race  are  capable  of  acquiring  and  mastering 
the  most  difficult  studies,  and  attaining  the  highest  culture  given  by  our  best  colleges.  The 
promptness  and  beauty  of  their  translations,  together  with  their  accuracy,  showing  a  knowledge 
of  the  structure  of  the  language  as  well  as  the  thought  of  the  classics  they  translated,  was  most 
gratifying  to  the  friends  of  education,  as  well  as  to  their  instructors.  So,  too,  in  Botany,  pursued 
but  a  single  term,  the  examination  was  most  satisfactory  in  the  knowledge  of  the  terminology  of 
the  science,  the  principles  of  classification,  and  the  ability  to  analyze  plants,  explain  their  struct- 
ure, and  determine  their  order  and  species  in  the  vegetable  world." 

The  normal  instruction  of  Fisk  University  is  constantly  supplying  the  colored 
race  with  efficient  and  pious  teachers.  The  privations  which  the  negro  will 
inflict  upon  himself  for  the  sake  of  maintaining  himself  in  the  University  (for  it 
is  not,  like  Hampton,  a  manual  labor  school)  are  almost  incredible.  The  Univer- 
sity stands  upon  the  site  of  Fort  Gillam,  in  a  beautiful  section  of  Nashville,  and 
the  town  negroes  never  pass  it  without  a  lingering  look  at  the  doors  of  the  build- 
ing, as  if  they  all  would  enter  if  they  could. 

At  Be»*ea  College,  near  the  old  estates  of  Cassius  M.  Clay,  the  famous 
abolitionist,  in  Madison  county,  Kentucky,  the  spectacle  of  both  races  studying 
in  the  same  institution  in  completest  harmony  may  be  seen.  A  prosperous 
school  was  started  at  Berea  several  years  before  the  war  by  a  missionary  who 
had  been  successful  in  founding  antislavery  churches  in  the  South ;  but  when 
the  John  Brown  raid  occurred,  the  slaveholders  broke  up  Berea.  At  the  close  of 
the  war  the  teachers  returned,  and  found  their  homes  and  buildings  uninjured. 
They  at  once  opened  a  school  into  which  both  races  were  received  upon  e>qual 
footing.  This  was  a  source  of  great  astonishment  to  the  white  Kentuckians  for  a 
time ;  but  they  finally  began  to  send  their  children,  and  now  the  regular  propor- 
tion of  white  students  is  about  two-fifths,  many  of  whom  are  young  ladies.  The 
annual  commencement  exercises  bring  together  audiences  of  a  thousand  or  fifteen 
hundred  persons,  black  and  white,  ex- Confederate  and  Unionist,  who  look  ap- 
provingly upon  the  progress  of  students  of  both  colors.  Rev.  E.  H.  Fairchild, 
brother  of  the  President  of  Oberlin,  presides  over  the  faculty.  Donations  from 
the  North  are  rapidly  building  up  this  institution,  one  of  the  few  in  the  ex-slave 
States  where  blacks  and  whites  study  harmoniously  together. 

The  University  at  Atlanta  met  with  much  opposition ;  the  Georgians  seemed 
disinclined  to  believe  in  the  sincerity  of  those  who  had  come  to  teach  the  negroes. 


606  ATLANTA     AND      TALLADEGA      UNIVERSITIES. 

After  the  institution,  which  was  incorporated  in  1867,  had  been  in  operation  two 
years,  it  was  visited  by  a  committee  of  prominent  Southern  gentlemen,  many  of 
whom  were  severely  prejudiced  against  negro  schools,  but  who  were  forced 
to  admit,  in  their  report  made  to  the  Governor  of  the  State,  that  "  the  system 
of  intellectual  and  moral  training  adopted  in  the  school"  was  eminently  practical. 
It  was  evident,  also,  from  other  sentences  in  their  report,  that  they  began  to 
believe  in  the  possibility  of  the  education  of  the  negro  masses,  as  they,  added 
that  the  satisfactory  answers  of  the  pupils  "to  questions  tended  to  define  the 
character  of  their  moral  training,  their  polite  behavior,  general  modesty  of  de- 
meanor, and  evident  economy  and  neatness 'of  dress,  are  indicative  of  a  convic- 
tion on  the  part  of  the  pupils  that  they  are  being  educated  for  usefulness,  and 
not  for  mere  ostentation  or  to  gratify  a  selfish  ambition."  They  found  that  the 
African  could  stand  very  rigid  tests  in  algebra  and  geometry,  and  "  fully  com- 
prehend the  construction  of  difficult  passages  in  the  classics."  Atlanta  University 
has  two  hundred  and  fifty  students,  has  received  aid  from  the  Legislature,  and 
annually  sends  out  well-educated  colored  teachers  from  its  normal  department. 

The  college  at  Talladega,  Alabama,  was  chartered  in  1869,  and  has  already 
sent  out  many  faithful  workers.  A  paragraph  from  the  pen  of  Rev.  George 
Whipple,  of  New  York,  concerning  a  recent  examination  of  the  classes  at  Talla- 
dega, contains  some  important  testimony : 

"Those  who  know  anything  of  the  educational  work  among  the  colored  people  need  not 
be  told  that  they  are  seldom  at  fault  in  studies  exercising  mainly  the  memory;  but  many,  if  not 
most,  have  doubted  their  ability  in  studies  requiring  the  exercise  of  the  reasoning  faculty. 
There  was  here,  however,  no  failure.  On  the  contrary,  that  which  made  the  most  marked 
impression  on  those  who  were  familiar  with  schools  in  the  North  twenty  and  twenty-five  years 
ago,  was  the  well-sustained  examination  in  English  Grammar  and  Algebra,  showing  a  power  of 
analysis,  under  the  circumstances,  really  surprising." 

In  the  theological  department  of  this  University,  young  colored  men  are  pre- 
pared for  the  ministry,  and  are  given  an  impulse  in  the  direction  of  real  mission- 
ary work,  so  much  needed  among  the  reckless  emotional  negroes  in  the  interior 
districts  of  the  South. 

The  Straight  University  at  New  Orleans  has  nearly  250  pupils,  and  among 
the  dusky  attendants  there  are  diligent  students  in  Greek,  Latin,  and  Algebra. 
The  importance  of  this  institution  to  the  negroes  of  the  South-west  cannot  be 
overestimated.  In  no  other  State  does  the  negro,  when  left  to  himself,  touch 
so  closely  upon  barbarism  as  in  the  remote  portions  of  Louisiana;  an'd  the 
training  of  colored  teachers  who  can  reach  the  untaught  masses  is  a  work  of 
the  highest  beneficence.  The  programme  of  the  University  is  certainly  ample; 
how  necessary  its  existence  to  the  good  of  the  State  is  may  be  understood  from 
the  statement  of  what  it  proposes  to  do : 

"  To  train  the  half-heathen  preachers  of  this  State  into  a  useful  Christian  ministry;  to  give 
its  colored  legislators  so  much  knowledge  of  history  and  law  as  to  make  their  votes  intelligent, 
and  to  awaken  as  much  self-respect  as  shall  lift  them  above  temptation  to  take  a  bribe ;  to  furnish 
teachers  to  our  crudely-organized  public  schools ;  to  gather  into  the  fold  of  the  Church  this  vast 
Roman  Catholic  population ;  to  win  them  to  us  by  showing  them  that  Straight  University  is,  in 


STRAIGHT     UNIVERSITY  —  TOUGALOO.  607 

its  instructors,  buildings,  libraries,  apparatus,  discipline,  Christian  courtesies,  scholarship,  and 
general  management,  wholly  superior  to,  and  broader  than,  their  parochial  and  conventual 
schools ;  to  make  it  safe  for  the  republic  that  the  newly-created  citizens  of  Louisiana  should  retain 
their  franchise,  and  to  prevent  Louisiana  from  being  Mexicanized  by  frequent  revolutions;  in 
brief,  to  infuse  a  wholesome  Christian  life  into  the  mingled  mass  of  negro  and  Latin  blood, — is  a 
work  which  must  be  done  for  its  own  sake,  for  the  sake  of  the  nation,  and  for  Christ's  sake." 

There  is  but  one  chartered  normal  school  for  the  tens  of  thousands  of  freed- 
men  in  Mississippi,  the  one  heretofore  mentioned  as  at  Tougaloo.  It  has  nearly 
300  students ;  the  manual  labor  system  has  been  introduced  to  some  extent ;  the 
normal  school  is  successful ;  but  half-a-dozen  such  institutions,  amply  endowed, 
are  necessary  to  give  proper  facilities  for  education  to  the  swarming  masses  of 
blacks. 

.  It  has  been  the  fashion  in  both  North  and  South  to  believe  that  the  negro 
would  prove  susceptible  of  cultivation  only  to  a  certain  point.  But  the  universal 
testimony  of  the  mass  of  careful  observers  is  that  the  negro  can  go  as  far  in 
mental  processes  as  the  white  child.  The  blacks  have  wonderful  memories  and 
strong  imitative  propensities;  eloquence,  passionate  and  natural;  a  strange  and 
subtle  sense  of  rhythm  and  poetry;  and  it  is  now  pretty  well  settled  that  there 
are  no  special  race  limitations.  Why,  then,  should  they  not  go  forward  to  a 
good  future  ?  Is  it  not  the  duty  of  that  section  which  gave  them  political  power 
before  they  were  fit  to  use  it,  to  give  them  every  opportunity  to  fit  themselves 
for  its  exercise  ?  It  will  be  long  before  they  can,  of  their  own  effort,  supply  the 
funds  needed  for  their  education  ;  until  they  can,  the  North  should  not  fail  to 
foster  all  the  schools  which,  like  the  normal  institutions  whose  history  has  been 
reviewed  in  this  chapter,  sow  the  good  seed. 

The  schools  are  doing  much  to  lift  up  the  negro's  idea  of  the  dignity  of 
religion.  Emphatically  Christian  institutions,  they  strive  to  inculcate  that  moral- 
ity and  self-denial  which  it  seems  so  difficult  for  the  blacks  to  exercise.  Although 
there  are  many  exemplary  Christians  among  the  freedmen  and  freedwomen,  it 
may  safely  be  said  that  the  majority  do  not  allow  their  religion  to  interfere  with 
their  desires.  They  believe  in  the  spasmodic  shouting,  stamping,  and  groaning 
which  characterize  their  meetings  as  essentials  of  true  worship ;  they  are  excited 
to  the  most  exalted  state  by  the  rude  and  picturesque  harangues  of  their  preach- 
ers, and  obey  them  implicitly,  so  far  as  they  understand  them.  But  they  often 
make  their  camp-meetings  and  revival  assemblies  the  scenes  of  indecent  orgies, 
and  -in  some  States  where  great  numbers  of  ignorant  negroes  are  gathered 
together,  they  turn  the  church  into  a  den  of  roystering  drunkards.  The  preach- 
ers are  sometimes  very  immoral,  and  now  and  then,  after  exhorting  for  an  hour 
or  two  in  such  a  violent  manner  that  one  might  imagine  them  possessed  by  the 
spirit,  they  will  join  in  the  worst  carousals  of  their  parishioners.  But  wherever 
education  goes,  this  conduct  ceases.  The  missionaries  from  the  normal  schools 
strive  against  the  besetting  sins  of  the  African,  and  are  gradually  helping 
him.  The  school-house  and  the  church  together,  with  intelligent  and  earnest 
advisers  in  each,  will  transform  the  character  of  the  freedman  in  another 
generation. 


608  COLORED      MEN      IN     THE      MINISTRY. 

The  negroes  have  a  profusion  of  churches,  organized  by  themselves,  in  all  the 
large  cities  of  the  South  and  South-west ;  in  Memphis,  in  New  Orleans,  in  Rich- 
mond, and  in  Charleston  the  churches  are  very  well  sustained,  and  are  attended 
by  immense  congregations.  The  preaching  is  sometimes  absolutely  fine ;  there 
are  colored  men  of  great  culture  and  natural  talent  in  the  ministry ;  but,  as  a 
rule,  the  ministers  are  rude  in  their  language,  forcible  in  their  illustrations,  and 
possessed  of  an  enthusiasm  which,  whether  or  not  the  proof  of  a  rare  spirituality, 
is  certainly  inspiring  to  any  one  who  witnesses  it.  The  emotional  part  of  the 
black  man's  worship  is,  of  course,  that  which  develops  the  greatest  number  of 
peculiarities.  It  will  always,  even  when  the  race  is  educated,  remain  a  striking 
feature  in  his  churches ;  but  will  be  chastened  and  subdued.  The  rapturous 
shoutings,  the  contortions  of  the  body,  the  desire  to  dance  and  to  yell,  the  mys- 
terious trances,  now-a-days  seen,  as  they  were  before  the  war,  in  assemblages  of 
blacks  overcome  with  religious  excitement,  will  be  greatly  modified,  but  will 
never  be  lost  sight  of.  Under  powerful  mental  excitement  of  any  kind,  the 
American  negro  finds  it  difficult  to  "keep  still.''  The  exuberance  of  his  animal 
spirits  gets  relief  only  in  dancing,  in  gambols  high  in  air,  in  grotesque  gestures ; 
and  this  is  all  the  more  noticeable  from  the  fact  that  in  repose  his  favorite  atti- 
tude is  slouching  and  inactive. 

The  theological  department  in  the  excellent  Howard  University  at  Washing- 
ton, and  the  classes  in  theology  in  the  other  universities,  are  kept  well  recruited, 
and  the  graduates  go  out  to  teach  the  negroes  a  "different  kind  of  religion  from 
mere  shouting  and  confusion."  In  the  back-country,  log  churches  are  built;  in 
the  towns,  houses  are  rented,  or  neat  brick  edifices  are  erected.  The  ministers 
who  go  into  the  interior  districts  make  efforts  to  have  the  negroes  from  several 
contiguous  plantations  unite  in  building  a  church,  and  are  generally  successful. 
In  many  sections  negroes  have  been  converted  from  practices  resembling  bar- 
barism to  sincere  Christian  worship.  But  for  the  millions  of  freedmen  and  women 
in  the  South  the  work  which  has  already  been  done  is  only  as  a  drop  in  the 
bucket.  Hundreds  of  thousands  of  dollars  are  needed  to  supply  this  people  with 
the  barest  necessities  of  their  intellectual  improvement ;  a  steady  charity  for  ten 
years  to  come  will  be  in  no  wise  mistaken.  They  need,  above  all,  to  be  taught 
how  to  help  themselves ;  and  by  the  normal  schools  and  the  complete  education 
of  the  most  promising  individuals  of  their  race,  that  will  be  soonest  accomplished. 


LXVIII. 

NEGRO     SONGS     ANT)     SINGERS. 

THE  negro  would  deserve  well  of  this  country  if  he  had  given  it  nothing  but 
the  melodies  by  which  he  will  be  remembered  long  after  the  carping  critics 
who  refuse  to  admit  that  he  is  capable  of  intellectual  progress  are  forgotten.  His 
songs  of  a  religious  nature  are  indisputable  proofs  of  the  latent  power  for  an 
artistic  development  which  his  friends  have  always  claimed  for  him.  They  are 
echoes  from  the  house  of  bondage,  cries  in  the  night,  indistinct  murmurs  from  an 
abyss.  They  take  directly  hold  upon  the  Infinite.  They  are  sublimest  and 
most  touching  when  they  partake  of  the  nature  of  wails  and  appeals.  They 
have  strange  hints  and  gleams  of  nature  in  them,  mingled  with  intense  spiritual 
fervor.  .  In  this  song,  which  the  toilers  in  the  tobacco  factories  of  Virginia  used 
to  sing,  there  is  a  wild  faith,  and  a  groping  after  the  proper  poetry  in  which  to 
express  it,  which  touch  the  heart : 

"  May  de  Lord  —  He  will  be  glad  of  me, 
In  de  heaven  He  '11  rejoice ; 
In  de  heaven  once,  in  de  heaven  twice, 
In  de  heaven  He  '11  rejoice. 

Bright  sparkles  in  de  churchyard, 
Give  light  unto  de-  tomb; 

Bright  summer,  spring  's  ober, 
Sweet  flowers  in  de'r  bloom." 

This  is  the  incoherence  of  ignorance ;  but  when  sung,  no  one  can  doubt  the 
yearning,  the  intense  longing  which  prompted  it.  The  movement  of  the  melodies 
is  strong  and  sometimes  almost  resistless ;  the  rhythm  is  perfect ;  the  measure  is 
steady  and  correct. 

But  little  idea  of  the  beauty  and  inspiration  •  of  the  "  slave  music  "  can  be 
conveyed  by  the  mere  words.  The  quaintness  of  the  wild  gestures  which 
accompany  all  the  songs  cannot  be  described.  At  camp-meetings  and  revival- 
gatherings  the  slaves  give  themselves  up  to  contortions,  to  stampings  of  feet, 
clappings  of  hands,  and  paroxysms  affecting  the  whole  body,  when  singing.  The 
simplest  hymns  are  sung  with  almost  extravagant  intensity. 

The  songs  are  mainly  improvisations.  But  few  were  ever  written ;  they 
sprang  suddenly  into  use.  They  arose  out  of  the  ecstasy  occasioned  by  the  rude 
and  violent  dances  on  the  plantation ;  they  were  the  outgrowth  of  great  and 
unavoidable  sorrows,  which  forced  the  heart  to  voice  its  cry;  or  they  bubbled  up 
from  the  springs  of  religious  excitement.  Sometimes  they  were  simply  the 
expression  of  the  joy  found  in  vigorous,  healthy  existence ;    but  of  such  there 


6lO  NEGRO      SONGS IMPROVISATIONS. 

are  few.     The  majority  of  the  negro  songs  have  a  plaintive  undertone.     They 
are  filled  with  such  passionate  outbursts  as  the  following: 

"Nobody  knows  de  trouble  I  see,  Lord, 
Nobody  knows  de  trouble  I   see; 
Nobody  knows  de  trouble  I  see,   Lord, 

Nobody  knows  like  Jesus ! 
Brudders,  will  you  pray  for  me, 

And  help  me,  to  drive  old  Satan  away?" 

The  improvisations  are  in  some  cases  remarkable.  A  student  at  the  Hampton 
Normal  School  has  given  to  the  public  a  long  rhapsody  on  the  judgment  day,  im- 
provised by  an  old  slave  who  was  densely  ignorant,  but  who  embodied  his  dreams 

in  song,  as  follows  : 

"I'm  a  gwine  to  tell  yo'  bout  de  comin'  of  de  Savior, 

Far'  you  well,  Far'  you  well; 
Dar's  a  better  day  a  comin', 

Far'  you  well,  Far'  you  well; 
When  my  Lord  speaks  to  his  Fader, 

Far'  you  well,  Far'  you  well; 
Says  Fader,  I  'm  tired  of  bsarin', 

Far'  you  well,  Far'  you  well ; 
Tired  o'  bearin'  for  pore  sinners, 

Far'  you  well,  Far'  you  well ; 
Oh!  preachers,  fold  your  Bibles, 

Far'  you  well,  Far'  you  well ; 
Prayer  makers,  pray  no  more, 

Far'  you  well,  Far'  you  well ; 
For  de  last  soul's  converted, 

Far'  you  well,  Far'  you  well ; 
In  dat  great  giltin'-  up  momin ', 

Far'  you  well,  Far'  you  well." 

The  terrors  of  the  judgment  day  are  portrayed  with  a  vivid  and  startling 
eloquence,  and  these  verses  are  usually  sung  with  a  rude  dramatic  force  which 

is  really  fine : 

"  Gabriel,  blow  your  trumpet ! 
Lord,  how  loud  shall  I  blow  it? 
Loud  as  seven  peals  of  thunder, 
Wake  de  sleeping  nations ; 
Den  yo'  see  pore  sinners  risin', 
See  de  dry  bones  a  creepin', 

Far'  you  well,  Far'  you  well. 

"  Den  yo'  see  de  world  on  fire, 
Yo'  see  de  moon  a  bleedin', 
See  de  stars  a  fallin', 
See  de  elements  meltin', 
See  de  forked  lightnin'. 
Hear  de  rumblin'  thunder; 
Earth  shall  reel  and  totter, 
Hell  shall  be  uncapped, 
De  dragon  shall  be  loosened, 
Far'  you  well,  pore  sinner, 

Far'  you  well,  Far'  you  welL" 


HYMNS  —  CAMP-MEETING     SONGS  —  B'ANDS.  6ll 

Nothing  can  exceed  in  beauty  and  fervor  this  little  hymn,  sprung  out  of  great 
sorrow  and  affliction.     It  lays  hold  upon  Heaven,  and  will  not  be  thrust  aside : 

"  O  Lord,  O  my  Lord, 
O  my  good  Lord, 

Keep  me  from  sinkin '  down ! 

0  my  Lord,  O  my  good  Lord, 
Keep  me  from  sinkin '  down ! 

1  tell  you  what  I  mean  to  do, 
Keep  me  from  sinkin '  down ; 

I  mean  to  go  to  Heaven  too, 
Keep  me  from  sinkin '  down  ! " 

One  of  the  most  notable  of  the  songs  refers  to  a  "  great  camp-meeting  in 
the  promised  land,"  and  is  said  to  have  been  first  sung  by  a  company  of  slaves, 
who  were  not  allowed  to  sing  or.  pray  where  the  master  could  hear  them ;  but 
when  he  died  their  mistress  granted  them  the  privilege  of  singing  and  praying  in 
their  cabins  at  night,  and  they  often  joyfully  sang  this  hymn : 

Dere  's  a  better  day  comin ',  don  't  you  get  weary, 

Better  day  a  comin',   don't  you  get,  &c,  (bis) 

Dere 's  a  great  camp-meetin '  in  de  Promised  Land, 

Oh  slap  your  hands  childron,   don't,  &c, 

Slap  your  hands  childron,   don 't,   &c. ,  (bis) 

Dere 's  a  great  camp-meetin '  in  de  Promised  Land. 

Oh  pat  your  foot  childron,   don 't  you  get  weary, 

Pat  your  foot  childron,  don't,   &c,  (bis) 

Dere 's  a  great  camp-meetin '  in  de  Promised  Land. 

Cho. — Gwine  to  live  wid  God  forever, 

Live  wid  God  forever,  (bis) 

Dere  "s  a  great  camp-meetin '  in  de  Promised  Land. 

Oh,  feel  de  Spirit  a  movin',  don't  you,  &c, 

Feel  de  Spirit  movin',  don't,  &c,  (bis) 

Dere 's  a  great  camp-meetin '  in  de,  &c. 

Oh  now  I  'm  gettin '  happy,  don 't  you  get  weary, 

Now  I'm  gettin'  happy,   don't,   &c,  (bis) 

Dere 's  a  great  camp-meetin '  in  de,  &c. 

I  feel  so  happy,  don 't  you   get  weary, 

Feel  so  happy,   don't  you  get  weary,  (bis) 

Dere's  a  great  camp-meetin'  in  de,  &c. 

Cho. — Oh,  fly  an'  nebber  tire, 

Fly  an'  nebber  tire,  (bis) 

Dere 's  a  great  camp-meetin '  in  de  Promised  Land. 

Throughout  the  South,  wherever  the  negroes  have  gathered  into  large  com- 
munities by  themselves,  one  will  generally  find  a  very  good  brass  band ;  yet 
probably  not  one  of  its  members  can  read  music.  They  play  by  rote  with  re- 
markable accuracy,  and  they  learn  a  song  by  hearing  it  once.  The  rhythm 
mastered,  they  readily  catch  the  tune,  and  never  forget  it.  Every  one  sings ; 
man,  woman  and  child  croon  over  their  toil,  but  never  with  that  joyous  abandon 
so  characteristic  of  other  races.     In  the  churches   the  hymns   are  often  "lined 


6l2  ENTHUSIASM      OF     NEGRO      SINGERS. 

out" — that  is,  each  line  is  read  by  the  deacon  or  preacher,  and  then  sung  by  the 

congregation ;   but  this  is  quite  unnecessary,  as  all  are  usually  familiar  with  the 

words.     In  hymns  and  songs  which  are  purely  enthusiastic,  the  lines  are  never 

read ;  the  worshipers  will  sometimes  spontaneously  break  into  a  rolling  chorus, 

which  almost  shakes  the  rafters  of  the  church.     Then  their  enthusiasm  will  die 

away  to  a  tearful  calm,  broken  only  now  and  again  by  sobs  and  "Amens!" 

The  appended  hymns,  sung  in  seasons  of  great  enthusiasm  by  the  negroes  in 

and  around  Chattanooga,  Tennessee,  will  serve  to  indicate  the  character  of  all 

of  that  class: 

"Oh,  yonder  come  my  Jesus, 

Hallelujah!    Hallelujah! 
Oh,  how  do  you  know  it's  Jesus? 

Hallelujah !    Hallelujah  ! 
I  know  Him  by  his   garments, 
I  know  him  by  his  garments. 
His  ship  is  heav-i-ly  loaded, 
His  ship  is  heav-i-ly  loaded, 

Hallelujah  !    Hallelujah ! 
It's  loaded  wid  bright  angels, 
It's  loaded  wid  bright  angels, 

Hallelujah  !    Hallelujah  ! 
Oh,  how  do  yo'  know  dey  are  angels? 

Hallelujah  !    Hallelujah ! 
I  know  dem  by  deir  shining, 
I  know  dem  by  deir  shining, 

Hallelujah !     Hallelujah  ! 

*  *  *  * 

"  O,  John!     my  Jesus'  comin', 
He  is  comin'  in  de  mornin' ; 
Jesus'  comin' ;     He's  comin'  by  de  lightning, 
Jesus'  comin' ;     He's  comin'  in  de  rainbow. 
Don't  you  want  to  go  to  Heaven  ? 

Jesus'  comin." 

*  *  *  >s  * 

"  Oh,   rock  away  chariot, 
Rock  all  my  crosses  away ; 
Rock  me  into  de  Heavens. 
I  wish't  I  was  in  Heaven — 
I  wish't  I  was  at  home. 
I  wish't  I  was  in  Heaven  — 
Lord,    I  wish't  I  was  at  home  !  " 

The  pilgrimages  of  the  "  Jubilee  "  and  Hampton  singers  through  this  coun- 
try and  England,  and  the  brilliant  success  which  attended  their  concerts,  is  a 
notable  event  in  the  history  of  the  American  negro.  When  the  Jubilee  Singers 
first  went  North  to  earn  money  for  the  University  which  was  giving  them  their 
education,  they  met  with  some  slights — were  now  and  then  called  "niggers" 
and  "negro  minstrels,"  and  were  varidusly  scoffed  at.  Here  and  there  in  the 
North  and  West  they  were  refused  admission  to  hotels  on  account  of  their 
color ;  their  success  was  at  first  a  matter  of  doubt ;  but  their  mission  pleaded  its 
way  into  the  hearts  of  men  when  the  sweet  melodies  and  wild  burdens  of  their 


THE      "JUBILEE"     AND      "HAMPTON"      SINGERS.  613 

songs  were  heard.  In  all  the  great  cities  of  the  North  their  concerts  were  at- 
tended by  large  audiences ;  Henry  Ward  Beecher  welcomed  them  in  Brooklyn, 
introducing  them  to  his  congregation  at  a  Sunday  evening  prayer-meeting, 
when  they  sang  some  of  their  most  effective  songs ;  and  straightway  thereafter 
they  were  the  rage  in  the  Metropolis  as  well  as  in  Brooklyn.  Their  tour 
through  the  Eastern  States  was  productive  of  much  profit,  and  the  little  band 
of  singers  carried  home  twenty  thousand  dollars  to  place  in  the  treasury  of  Fisk 
University,  as  the  result  of  their  first  campaign  in  the  North. 

Encouraged  by  this  success,  Prof.  George  L.  White,  who  originally  conceived 
the  idea  of  teaching  these  emancipated  slaves  to  sing  the  plantation  hymns  of 
the  old  times,  and  to  give  a  series  of  concerts  embodying  them,  took  the  singers 
to  England.  All  the  world  knows  how  enthusiastically  they  were  received  in 
Great  Britain.  The  Queen,  the  nobility,  and  the  great  middle  class  heard  them 
sing,  gave  them  kind  words  and  money,  and  praised  them  highly ;  and  in  March 
of  1874  this  little  band  of  blacks  had  collected  ten  thousand  pounds,  to  be  used 
to  pay  for  the  building  of  Jubilee  Hall,  at  the  University  at  Nashville.  Of  the 
eleven  singers,  eight  are  emancipated  slaves. 

The  Hampton  Student  Singers  at  first  numbered  seventeen.  They  made 
their  first  appearance  in  1872,  under  the  direction  of  Mr.  Thomas  P.  Fenner,  of 
Providence,  Rhode  Island,  who  was  of  peculiar  service  in  aiding  them  to  a  faith- 
ful musical  rendering  of  the  original  slave  songs.  The  singers  were  all  regular 
students  of  the  Hampton  Normal  Institute,  and,  even  while  journeying  on  their 
concert  tour,  carried  their  school-books  with  them.  Their  songs  were  heard  with 
delight  throughout  the  Middle,  Eastern,  and  Western  States,  and  their  concerts 
have  been  attended  with  financial  success. 

The  spirituality,  the  pathos,  the  subtle  plaintiveness  of  the  fresh,  pure  voices 
of  these  bands  of  black  singers,  invest  the  commonest  words  with  a  beauty  and 
poetry  which  cannot  be  understood  until  one  hears  the  songs.  Once  while 
listening  to  the  singing  of  "  Dust  an'  Ashes,"  one  of  the  sweetest  and  sublimest 
chorals  ever  improvised,  I  tried  in  vain  to  analyze  its  mysterious  fascination.  The 
words  were  few  and  often  repeated ;  the  melody  was  from  time  to  time  almost 
monotonous.  I  could  not  fix  the  charm ;  yet  the  tears  stood  in  my  eyes  when 
the  wild  chant  was  over, — and  I  was  not  the  only  one  of  the  large  audience  gath- 
ered to  hear  the  singing  who  wept.  I  give  some  of  the  words ;  but  they  will 
hardly  serve  to  convey  to  the  reader's  mind  any  idea  of  the  beauty  of  the  choral: 

"  Dust,    dust  an'    ashes 

Fly  over  on  my  grave. 
Dust,  dust  an'   ashes 

Fly  over  on  my  grave,  (bis) 
An'  de  Lord  shall  bear   my  spirit  home,   (bis) 

Dey  crucified  my  Savior 

And  nailed    him   to  de  cross,   (bis) 
An'  de  Lord  shall  bear  my  spirit  home. 
He  rose,   he   rose, 

He  rose   from   de  dead,  (repeat) 
An'  de   Lord   shall  bear  my  spirit  home." 


6l4  SPECIMENS     OF      SPIRITUAL     SONGS. 

One  of  the  most  effective  of  the  spiritual  songs  is  "  Babylon  's  Fallin',"  which 
is   often   used    at  Hampton  Institute  as  a  marching  song.     The  words  are  as 

follows : 

"  Pure  city, 
Babylon  's   fallin'  to  rise  no  mo'. 
Pure  city, 

Babylon  's  fallin'  to  rise  no  mo'. 
Oh,    Babylon  's   fallin',  fallin',  fallin', 
Babylon  's   fallin'  to  rise  no  mo'. 
Oh,  Jesus  tell  you  once  befo' 
Babylon  's    fallin'  to  rise   no  mo'; 
To  go  in  peace  and  sin    no  mo' — 
Babylon  's  fallin'  to  rise   no  mo'." 

Another  note  of  aspiration  is  sounded  in  the  hymn  "  Swing  Low,  Sweet 
Chariot,"  the  music  of  which  is  full  of  earnest  prayer : 

"  Oh,   swing  low,   sweet   chariot ; 

Swing  low,  sweet  chariot,  (bis) 
I  don't  want  to  leave  me  behind. 
Oh  de  good  ole  chariot  swing  so  low, 

Good  old  chariot  swing  so  low, 
I  don't    want  to  leave  me  behind." 

Even  the  religious  hymns  and  songs  are  not  devoid  of  that  humor  with  which 
the  negro  is  so  freely  endowed,  and  some  of  the  words  to  hymns  intended  to  be 
of  the  most  serious  character  are  highly  ludicrous,  as  when  we  are  informed, 
concerning  a  "  pore  sinner,"   that 

"  Vindictive  vengeance    on  him  fell, 
Enough  to  sqush   a  world  to  hell;" 

or  when  we  hear  a  hundred  negroes  loudly  singing — 

"  Jesus  ride  a  milk-white  hoss, 
Ride  him  up  and  down  de  cross — 
Sing  Hallelujah  !" 

It  is  difficult  to  repress  a  smile  when  listening  to  the  story  of  the  deluge  and 
Noah's  voyage,  as  detailed  in  the  popular  choral  hymn  entitled,  "  De  Ole  Ark  a- 
Moverin'  Along."     The  last  verse  will  give  the  reader  a  taste  of  its  quality : 

"  Forty  days  an'  forty  nights,  de  rain  it  kep'  a  fallin', 
De   ole  ark   a-moverin',   a-moverin'   along; 
De  wicked  dumb  de  trees,    an'  for  help  dey  kep'  a  callin', 

De   ole  ark  a-moverin',  &c, 
Dat  awful  rain,  she  stopped  at  last,  de  waters  dey  subsided, 

De  old  ark  a-moverin',   &c, 
An'  dat   old  ark  wid  all  on   board  on  Ararat  she  rided, 
De  old  ark  a-moverin',  &c. 
CHORUS — Oh,  dc  ole   ark   a-moverin',"  &c. 


LAUGHABLE     SONGS HINTS     AT     DELIVERANCE.  6l$ 

A  hymn  called  the  "  Danville  Chariot,"  which  is  very  popular  with  the 
negroes  in  Virginia,  has  this  verse : 

"Oh  shout,  shout,  de  deb'l  is   about; 
Oh  shut  yo'  do'   an'  keep  him  out ; 

I  don'  want  to  stay  here  no  longer. 
For  he  is  so  much-a  like-a  snaky  in  de  grass, 
Ef  you  don'  mind  he   will  get   you  at  las', 
I  don'  want  to  stay  here  no  longer. 
Chorus — Oh,  swing  low,  sweet  chariot,"  &c. 

The  quaintness  of  the  following  often  induces  laughter,  although  it  is  always 
sung  with  the  utmost  enthusiasm  : 

"  Gwine  to  sit  down  in  de  kingdom,   I  raly  do  believe 

Whar  Sabbaths  have  no  end. 
Gwine  to  walk  about  in  Zion,  I  raly  do  believe, 

Whar  Sabbaths  have  no  end. 
Whar  ye  ben,  young  convert,   whar  ye  ben  so  long? 
Ben  down  low  in  de  valley  for  to  pray, 
And  I  ain't  done  prayin'  yit." 

"  Go,  Chain  de  Lion  Down,"  is  the  somewhat  obscure  title  of  a  hymn  in 
which  this  verse  occurs : 

"Do  you  see  dat  good  ole  sister, 
Come  a-waggin'  up  de  hill  so  slow? 
She  wants  to   get  to  Heaven  in  due  time, 
Before  de  heaven  doors  clo'. 

Go  chain  de  lion  down, 

Go  chain  de  lion  down, 
Befo'  de  heaven  doors  clo'." 

Many  years  before  the  period  of  bondage  was  over,  and  when  it  seemed 
likely  to  endure  so  long  as  the  masters  pleased,  the  negroes  hinted  in  their 
hymns  at  their  coming  deliverance.  They  often  compared  themselves  to  the 
Israelites,  and  many  of  their  most  touching  songs  have  some  allusion  to  King 
Pharaoh  and  the  hardness  of  his  heart.  A  few  of  the  more  noted  of  the  songs, 
which  were  the  outgrowth  of  the  negro's  prophetic  instinct  that  some  day  he 
should  be  free,  are  still  sung  in  the  churches  and  schools.     This  is  a  favorite 

among  the  blacks : 

"  Did  n't  my  Lord  deliber  Daniel, 
Did  n't  my  Lord  deliber  Daniel, 

,  And  why  not  ebery  man? 
He  delibered  Daniel  from  de  lion's  den, 
And  Jonah  from  de  belly  of  de  whale, 
An'  de  Hebrew  children  from  de  fiery  furnace, 
And  why  not  ebery  man  ? " 

"  Go  Down,  Moses,"  was  another  warning  of  the  "  wrath  to  come,"  which 
those  in  power  did  not  soon  enough  accept.  It  was  sung  at  many  a  midnight 
meeting,  when  the  masters  did  not  listen ;    and  the  oppressed  took  comfort  as 


6l6  ANALYSIS      OF     THE      NEGRO'S      "HEART-MUSIC." 

they  joined  in  its  chorus.     The  free  children  of  parents  who  were  born  in  slavery 
will  look  upon  this  song  with  a  tearful  interest : 

"  When  Israel  was  in  Egypt's  land, 

Let  my  people  go; 
Oppressed  so  hard  dey  could  not  stand, 

Let  my  people  go. 
Go  down,   Moses, 

Way  down  in  Egypt  land, 
Tell  ole  Pha-roh, 

Let  my  people  go. 

"  Thus  saith  de  Lord,  bold  Moses  said, 
Let  my  people  go ; 
If  not  I  '11  smite  your  first-born  dead, 
Let  my  people  go. 

Go  down,   Moses,"  &c. 

"  No  more  shall  dey  in  bondage  toil, 
Let  my  people  go ; 
Let  dem  come  out  wid  Egypt's  spoil, 
Let  my  people  go. 

Go  down,  Moses,"  &c. 

The  "  first-born  "  have  indeed  been  smitten,  and  Israel  has  come  up  out  of 
Egypt. 

"  Mr.  Theodore  F.  Seward,  of  Orange,  New  Jersey,  in  his  interesting  preface 
to  the  collection  of  songs  sung  by  the  Jubilee  Singers  of  Fisk  University,  makes 
the  following  remarks,  which  may  help  to  a  proper  comprehension  of  the  negro's 
heart-music : 

"  A  technical  analysis  of  these  melodies  shows  some  interesting  facts.  The 
first  peculiarity  that  strikes  the  attention  is  in  the  rhythm.  This  is  often  compli- 
cated, and  sometimes  strikingly  original.  But  although  so  new  and  strange,  it  is 
most  remarkable  that  these  effects  are  so  extremely  satisfactory.  We  see  few 
cases  of  what  theorists  call  mis-form,  although  the  student  of  musical  composi- 
tion is  likely  to  fall  into  that  error  long  after  he  has  mastered  the  leading  prin- 
ciples of  the  art. 

"  Another  noticeable  feature  of  the  songs  is  the  entire  absence  of  triple  time, 
or  three-part  measure,  among  them.  The  reason  for  this  is  doubtless  to  be  found 
in  the  beating  of  the  foot  and  the  swaying  of  the  body  which  are  such  frequent 
accompaniments  of  the  singing.  These  motions  are  in  even  measure,  and  in  per- 
fect time ;  and  so  it  will  be  found  that,  however  broken  and  seemingly  irregular 
the  movement  of  the  music,  it  is  always  capable  of  the  most  exact  measurement. 
In  other  words,  its  irregularities  invariably  conform  to  the  'higher  law'  of  the 
perfect  rhythmic  flow. 

"  It  is  a  coincidence  worthy  of  note  that  more  than  half  the  melodies  in  this 
collection  are  in  the  same  scale  as  that  in  which  Scottish  music  is  written ;  that 
is,  with  the  fourth  and  seventh  tones  omitted.  The  fact  that  the  music  of  the 
ancient  Greeks  is  also  said  to  have  been  written  in  this  scale  suggests  an  inter- 


THE      "SPIRITUALS" HOW      THEY      WERE      PRESERVED.  6\J 

esting  inquiry  as  to  whether  it  may  not  be  a  peculiar  language  of  nature,  or  a 
simpler  alphabet  than  the  ordinary  diatonic  scale,  in  which  the  uncultivated 
mind  finds  its  easiest  expression." 

The  teachers  attached  to  the  educational  mission  of  the  Port  Royal  Islands 
carefully  studied  the  music  of  the  half-barbarous  negroes  among  whom  they  were 
stationed,  and  the  result  was  an  excellent  collection  of  slave  songs,  which,  with- 
out their  efforts,  would  have  been  entirely  lost. 

The  old  planters  sometimes  say,  with  a  shake  of  the  head  and  a  frown,  that 
the  negroes  no  longer  sing  "as  they  used  to  when  they  were  happy."  It  is  true 
that  the  freedmen  do  not  sing  as  of  yore ;  that  they  sing  as  much,  however, 
there  is  little  doubt.  We  have  seen  that  the  better  class  of  their  songs  is  filled 
with  a  vein  of  reproachful  melancholy,  that  it  everywhere  has  the  nature  of  an 
appeal  for  help,  a  striving  for  something  spiritual,  dimly  seen,  and  but  half  under- 
stood. These  were  the  songs  which  the  slaves  sung  at  their  work,  but  since 
their  emancipation  they  are  no  longer  compelled  to  voice  their  talents  in  such 
sombre  music.  The  Port  Royal  teachers  took  down  from  the  lips  of  the  colored 
people  hundreds  of  songs  whose  crude  dialect  and  cruder  melancholy  rendered 
the  task  very  difficult. 

According  to  the  testimony  of  the  teachers  the  negroes  always  keep  exquisite 
time  in  singing,  and  readily  sacrifice  a-  word  and  the  sense  attached  to  it  if  it 
stands  in  the  way  of  the  rhythm.  The  voices  have  a  delicate  and  mellow  tone 
peculiar  to  the  colored  race.  There  is  rarely  part  singing,  as  it  is  not  generally 
understood,  and  yet  the  Port  Royal  teachers  say  that  when  a  number  of  blacks 
are  singing  together  no  two  appear  to  sing  the  same  thing.  The  leaders  start 
the  words  of  each  verse,  improvising  many  tunes,  and  the  others,  who  "  base  " 
him,  as  they  call  it,  will  strike  in  with  the  version,  or  when  they  know  the  words, 
will  join  in  the  solo.  They  always  succeed  in  producing  perfect  melody,  out 
of  whose  network  the  transcribers  have  found  great  difficulty  in  extracting 
sounds  that  can  be  properly  represented  by  the  gamut. 

The  teachers  testify  that  "  the  chief  part  of  the  negro  music  is  civilized 
in  its  character,  partly  composed  under  the  influence  of  association  with  the 
whites,  and  partly  actually  imitated  from  other  music ;  but,"  they  add,  "  in  the 
main  it  appears  to  be  original  in  the  best  sense  of  the  word."  Passages  in  some 
of  the  songs  are  essentially  barbaric  in  character,  and  the  teachers  believe  that 
most  of  the  secular  songs  in  use  among  the  negroes  contain  faint  echoes  from 
the  rude  music  of  the  African  savages.  A  gentleman  visiting  at  Port  Royal 
is  said  to  have  been  much  struck  with  the  resemblance  of  some  of  the  tunes 
sung  by  the  watermen  there  to  boatmen's  songs  he  had  heard  on  the  Nile. 
Colonel  Higginson,  who  spent  some  time  among  the  negroes  on  the  South 
Carolina  islands,  gives  a  curious  description  of  the  way  in  which  negro  songs 
were  originated.  One  day,  as  he  was  crossing  in  a  small  boat  from  one  island 
to  another,  one  of  the  oarsmen,  who  was  asked  for  his  theory  of  the  origin  of  the 
spirituals,  as  the  negroes  call  their  songs,  said,  "  Dey  start  jess  out  o'  curiosity. 
I  ben  a  raise  a  song  mysel'  once,"  and  then  described  to  Colonel  Higginson  that 
on  one  occasion   when  a  slave  he  began  to  sing,  "  O,  de  old   nigger- driver." 


6l8  THE     "SHOUT" RELIGIOUS     DANCES. 

Then  another  said,  "  Fust  ting  my  mammy  tole  me  was,  notin'  so  bad  as  nigger- 
drivers."  This  was  the  refrain,  and  in  a  short  time  all  the  slaves  in  the  field  had 
made  a  song  which  was  grafted  into  their  unwritten  literature.  Another  negro, 
in  telling  Mr.  J.  Miller  McKim,  one  of  the  teachers  on  the  island,  how  they 
made  the  songs,  said,  "  Dey  work  it  in,  work  it  in,  you  know,  till  dey  get  it 
right,  and  das  de  way." 

The  "shout,"  one  of  the  most  peculiar  and  interesting  of  the  religious  cus- 
toms of  the  slaves,  still  kept  up  to  some  extent  among  the  negroes  on  the  coast, 
is  discountenanced  by  many  of  the  colored  preachers  now-a-days.  It  is  what  may 
be  called  a  prayer- meeting,  interspersed  with  spasmodic  enthusiasm.  The  popu- 
lation of  a  plantation  gathers  together  in  some  cabin  at  evening,  and,  after 
vociferous  prayer  by  some  of  the  brethren,  and  the  singing  of  hymns  in  melan- 
choly cadence  by  the  whole  congregation,  all  the  seats  are  cleared  away,  and  the 
congregation  begins  the  genuine  "walk-around"  to  the  music  of  the  "spiritual." 

The  following  description  of  the  dance,  which  is  a  main  feature  of  these  shouts, 
appeared  in  the  New  York  Nation,  in  1867 : 

"The  foot  is  hardly  taken  from  the  floor,  and  the  progression  is  mainly  due 
to  a  jerking,  pitching  motion,  which  agitates  the  entire  shouters,  and  soon  brings 
out  streams  of  perspiration.  Sometimes  they  dance  slowly ;  sometimes,  as  they 
shuffle,  they  sing  the  chorus  of  the  spiritual,  and  sometimes  the  song  itself  is  also 
sung ;  but  more  frequently  a  band  composed  of  some  of  the  best  singers  and 
of  tired  shouters  stands  at  the  side  of  the  room  to  "  base  "  the  others  singing 
the  body  of  the  song,  and  clapping  their  hands  together  or  on  their  knees. 
Singing  and  dance  are  alike  extremely  energetic,  and  often  when  the  shout 
lasts  into  the  middle  of  the  night,  the  monotonous  thud  of  the  feet  prevents  sleep 
within  half  a  mile  of  the  'Praise-House.'" 

I  append  three  or  four  of  the  most  beautiful  of  the  songs  sung  by  the  ne- 
groes of  the  lowland  coast  of  South  Carolina.  That  entitled  "  Lord  Remember 
Me  "  attracted  universal  attention  when  it  first  appeared,  shortly  after  the  war, 
at  the  North.     It  was  set  to  weird  music,  and  had  the  genuine  ballad  flavor : 

I     HEAR     FROM     HEAVEN     TO-DAY. 

Hurry  on,  my  weary  soul, 

And  I  yearde  from  heaven  to-day, 

My  sin  is  forgiven,  and  my  soul  set  free, 

And  I  yearde,  etc. 

A  baby  born  in  Bethlehem, 

De  trumpet  sound  in  de  oder  bright  land; 

My  name  is  called  and  I  must  go, 

De  bell  is  a-ringin'  in  de  oder  bright  world. 

LORD      REMEMBER      ME. 

Oh  Deat'  he  is  a  little  man, 

And  he  goes  from  do'  to  do'; 

He  kill  some  souls  and  he  wounded  some, 

And  he  lef  some  souls  to  pray. 


SONGS  OF  SOUTH  CAROLINA  NEGROES.  619' 

Oh,  Lord,  remember  me,  • 

Do,  Lord,  remember  me; 
Remember  me  as  de  year  roll  round, 
Lord,  remember  me. 

NOT     WEARY     YET. 

0  me  not  weary  yet,   (repeat) 

1  have  a  witness  in  my  heart ; 

O  me  no  weary  yet,  Brudder  Tony, 
Since  I  ben  in  de  field  to  fight. 

0  me,  etc. 

1  have  a  heaven  to  maintain, 

De  bond  of  faith  are  on  my  soul; 
Ole  Satan  toss  a  ball  at  me, 
Him  tink  de  ball  would  hit  my  soul; 
De  ball  for  hell  and  I  for  heaven. 

HUNTING     FOR     THE     LORD. 

Hunt  till  you  find  him, 

Hallelujah ! 
And  a-huntin'  for  de  Lord,  .  * 

Till  you  find  him, 

Hallelujah ! 
And  a-huntin'  for  de  Lord. 

I     SAW     THE     BEAM     IN     MY     SISTER'S     EYE. 

I  saw  de  beam  in  my  sister's  eye, 
Can't  saw  de  beam  in  mine; 
You'd  better  lef '  your  sister's  door, 
Go  keep  your  own  door  clean. 

And  I  had  a  mighty  battle,  like-a  Jacob  and  de  angel, 

Jacob,  time  of  old ; 

I  did  n't  'tend  to'  lef  'em  go, 

Till  Jesus  bless  my  soul. 

RELIGION     SO      SWEET. 

0  walk  Jordan  long  road, 
And  religion  so  sweet ; 
O  religion  is  good  for  anything, 
And  religion  so  sweet. 
Religion  make  you  happy, 
Religion  gib  me  patience; 

0  'member,  get  religion. 

1  long  time  ben  a  huntin', 
I  seekin'  for  my  fortune; 

O  I  gwine  to  meet  my  Savior, 
Gwine  to  tell  him  bout  my  trials. 
Dey  call  me  boastin'  member, 
Dey  call  me  turnback  Christian; 
Dey  call  me  'struction  maker, 


40 


620  NEGRO     RELIGIOUS     SONGS. 

But  I  don't  care  what  dey  call  me. 
Lord,  trial  'longs  to  a  Christian, 

0  tell  me  'bout  religion ; 

1  weep  for  Mary  and  Marta, 

I  seek  my  Lord  and  I  find  him. 

MICHAEL,   ROW   THE   BOAT  ASHORE, 

Michael,  row  de  boat  ashore, 
Hallelujah  ! 
Michael  boat  a  gospel  boat, 

Hallelujah  ! 
I  wonder  where  my  mudder  deh, 
See  my  mudder  on  de  rock  gwine  home, 
On  de  rock  gwine  home  in  Jesus'  name; 
Michael  boat  a  music  boat, 
Gabriel  blow  de  trumpet  horn, 

0  you  mind  your  boastin'  talk ; 
Boastin'  talk  will  sink  your  soul. 
Brudder,  lend  a  helpin'  hand; 
Sister,  help  for  trim  dat  boat. 
Jordan's  stream  is  wide  and  deep; 
Jesus  stand  on  t'  oder  side. 

1  wonder  if  my  massa  deh  ; 

My  fader  gone  to  unknown  land, 
O  de  Lord  he  plant  his  garden  deh. 

I     WISH     I     BEN     DERE. 

My  mudder,  you  follow  Jesus, 
My  sister,   you  follow  Jesus, 
My  brudder,  you  follow  Jesus, 
To  fight  until  I  die. 

I  wish  I  ben  dere, 

To  climb  Jacob's  ladder; 

I  wish  I  ben  dere, 

To  wear  de  starry  crown. 

JESUS     ON     THE     WATER-SIDE. 

Heaven  bell  a-ring,  I  know  de  road, 
Heaven  bell  a-ring,  I  know  de  road; 
Jesus  sittin'  on  de  water-side, 
Do  come  along,  do  let  us  go, 
Jesus  sittin'  on  de  water-side. 


LXIX. 

A     PEEP     AT     THE      PAST      OF      VIRGINIA — JAMESTOWN. 
WILLIAMSBURG — YORKTOWN. 


AT  Jamestown,  on  the  river  James,  one  comes  suddenly  upon  memorials  of  a 
vanished  past.  The  Virginia  whose  life  once  centred  around  the  village 
on  the  placid  stream  has  passed  away.  Jamestown,  the  first  prominent  Anglo- 
Saxon  settlement  on  this  continent,  is  to-day  a  melancholy  nook  where  historic 
memories  play  at  hide-and-seek  among  moss-grown  ruins.  The  remains  of  the 
venerable  church  there  are  surrounded  with  a  graveyard  filled  with  mouldy 
tombstones,  whose  inscriptions  are  scarce- 
ly legible.  Tall  trees  tangle  their  roots 
in  the  brickwork  of  the  decaying  tower. 
Silence  and  desolation  brood  over  this 
ancient  edifice,  destroyed  nearly  a  century 
and  a-half  ago.  It  is  supposed  to  have 
been  built  a  little  after  Bacon's  rebellion  in 
1676,  and  is  known  to  have  been  in  use  as 
late  as  1733,  for  in  that  year  a  silver  bap- 
tismal font  v/as  presented  to  it.  Some  of 
the  pieces  of  silver  plate  that  belonged  to 
the  church  may  still  be  seen  in  the  library 
of  the  Theological  Seminary  near  Alex- 
andria. 

After  Captain  John  Smith  and  his  brave 
knights,  as  well  as  all  the  swaggering, 
starveling  gallants  and  tavern-haunting  vagabonds  who  first  colonized  Jamestown, 
had  crumbled  into  dust  and  made  way  for  the  more  enterprising  and  industrious 
native  Virginians,  the  town  was  deserted.  The  transfer  of  the  seat  of  the  Colo- 
nial Government  to  Williamsburg  in  the  beginning  of  the  eighteenth  century 
ruined  the  prospects  of  Jamestown,  and  the  swiftly- moving  years  have  now 
swept  everything  away  save  this  one  tower  of  the  old  church,  the  reflection  of 
whose  image  upon  the  river's  gleaming  surface  seems  like  a  ghost  from  the  past, 
peering  out  of  the  depths  into  which  the  present  has  banished  it. 

Williamsburg  and  Yorktown,  on  the  peninsula  between  the  York  and  James 
rivers,  contain  some  of  the  most  interesting  souvenirs  of  early  civilization  in 
America.  Williamsburg,  half-way  between  the  two  streams,  is  the  oldest  incor- 
porated town  in  the  State,  was  the  seat  of  the  Colonial  Government  before  the 


The  Ruins  of  the  old  Church  at  Jamestown,  Virginia. 


622 


WILLIAMSBURG     AND     ITS     PAST. 


Win 2    1      M        rP\      °f  ^  D°mini0n  Undl  W9'     °n  the  la™  in  front  of 
William   and    Mary  College,   the    oldest  of  American    educational   institutions 

except  Harvard,  stands  the  statue  of  Lord  Botetourt,  who  ruled  over  the  Vir 
gimans  some  years  previous  to  the  troubles  between  the  mother  country  and  the 
colonies,  andjvho^died  two  years  before  the  advent  of  the  great  Revolution. 

The  tide  of  war  has  from  time  to  time  swept 
round  the  College  buildings,  but  has  always 
respected  the  old  statue.     The  Virginians  of 
revolutionary  days  did   not  bring  the  good 
Lord  down  from  his  pedestal,  for  he  had  been 
a  faithful  Governor,  zealous  and  never  forget- 
ful  of  their   interests.     The   marble   image, 
however,  once  lost  its  head,  a  college  student,' 
who  afterward  became  Governor  of  Virginia, 
having  taken  a  fancy  to  knock  it  off;  but  it 
was  carefully  replaced.     William    and    Mary 
College  has  had  the  rare  honor  of  educating 
several    Presidents   of   the    United    States. 
During  the  late  civil  war  it   suffered  much, 
and  to-day  stands  in  serious  need  of  finan- 
cial aid. 

A  century  ago  a  noble  avenue,  known  as 
Gloucester  street,  extended  from  the  venera- 
ble college  for  a  mile   in   a  straight  line  to 

Statue  of  Lord  Botetourt  at  Wilbur,,  Virginia  ^  ^"9^  of  Virginia.        Along  its  sides 

t,.  u       ,  .  "      were  ranSed  the  P^ace  of  the  Governor   of 

Ctre°1i°<<r  W1"ainSf  ^  the  rest  h-ing  long  since  been  destroyed 
by  fire,  he  Court-House  of  James  City  County-  the  old  Raleigh  Tavern-  the 
octagonal  powder  magazine  which  served  as  the  colonial  arsenal  of  Virginia 
and  from  which  on  the  night  of  April  20,  i77S,  the  royal  Governor  stole  away" 
all  the  powder;  and  the  old  church  of  Bruton  parish.  The  powder  magazine 
to-day  serves  as  the  stable  for  the  principal  inn  of  Williamsburg.  The  College 
chapel,  designed  by  Sir  Christopher  Wren,  has  vanished  from  the  western 
extremity  of  the  great  avenue,  which  it  once  adorned.  Old  Bruton  Church 
standing  midway  between  the  College  and  the  site  of  the  ancient  Capitol  wt 
erected  shortly  after  the  noted  James  Blair,  commissary  to  the  Bishop  of  lT 

wood  rGSldent  °f  Wmiam  and  Mary  C°He^  became  *****  wh'en  Spots-" 

wood  u       Governor  m  l?lo      Whitfidd  often  ched  ,  bpots 

ou    takTL^Am35  *"  fT  ™  ***'  »«  *"  S^  *»  before  th 
outbreak    of  the  American  Revolution,   the  battle  of  the  rights  of  the  oeoole 

against  privilege  and  irresponsible  authority  was  fought.     The  Rev    Mr'sTa 

had  a  hearty  quarrel  with   Spotswood,  the    Governor"  insisting  upon  the  dgh 

of  choosing  parish  clergymen,  while  Blair  contended  for  the  right  of  ^vestries 

^«sp^eir  firm  attitude  the  vestries at  L T^ 


YORKTOWN WAR     MEMORIALS. 


623 


Spotswood,  although  hard-headed  and  obstinate,  was  one  of  the  ablest  and 
purest  of  Virginia's  chief  magistrates  in  her  colonial  days.  He  it  was  who 
built  the  first  iron-furnaces  in  the  colonies,  and  who  first  rode  across  the  great 
Blue  Ridge,  the  barrier  in  his  day  between  civilized  Virginia  and  the  wilderness 
beyond.  When  he  and  his  goodly  company  returned  to  Williamsburg  from  their 
long  and  adventurous  journey  across  the  mountains,  the  Governor  caused  a 
golden  horseshoe,  set  with  precious  stones,  to  be  given  to  each  of  his  fellow 
cavaliers  as  a  badge  of  knighthood,  bearing  the  motto,  "Sic  jicvat  transcendere 
monies"  This  was  the  origin  of  the  order  of  the  Knights  of  the  Golden  Horse- 
shoe. 

Yorktown  and  Williamsburg  are  both  destined  to  be  important  termini  of  the 
Chesapeake  and  Ohio  railroad.  Yorktown,  which  lies  within  a  few  miles  of  the 
colonial  capital,  still  possesses  some  of  the  picturesque  and  semi-decayed  man- 
sions of  the  old  Nelsons  and  Pages,  and  other  noble  families  of  Virginia.  .The 
traveler  is  yet  shown  the  precise  spot  at  Yorktown  where,  on  the  19th  of  October, 
1 78 1,  the  surrender  of  Lord  Cornwallis  to  the  combined  American  and  French 
forces  took  place,  the  remains  of  the  intrenchments  cast  up  by  the  British,  on  the 
south  and  east  sides  of  the  town,  being  still  visible.  An  excavation  in  the  bluff 
on  which  the  village  stands  is  called  Cornwallis's  Cave,  and  is  reputed  to  have 
been  made  and  used  by  Lord  Cornwallis  as  a  council-chamber  during  the  siege. 
Round  about  both  Williamsburg  and  Yorktown  there  are  many  newer  and  fresher 
memorials  of  war  than  those  half- forgotten  ones  of  the  Revolution. 

A  journey  up  the  York  river  from  Yorktown  takes  one  past  the  site  of  the 
Indian  settlement  which  John  Smith  described  as  "  Werowocomoco,"  and  where 
he  was  rescued  from  death  by  the  fair  Pocahontas.  Not  far  from  the  site  of 
this  romantic  rescue  stands  "Rose- 
well,"  formerly  the  estate  of  Governor 
Page,  a  princely  edifice,  whose  materi- 
als were  all  brought  over  from  England 
in  colonial  days,  and  which  now  stands 
lonely  on  a  barren  hill.  On  the  Pa- 
munkey  river  is  "White  House,"  said 
to  be  the  scene  of  Washington's 
marriage  with  Martha  Custis  in  1759. 
During  the  late  war,  White  House  was 
an  important  depot  of  supplies,  and 
the  fine  mansion  there  and  all  the 
supplies  were  burned  in  the  course  of 
military  operations. 

In  1584,  Queen  Elizabeth  licensed 

r-'-nrri,         tv   t    ■    1     .  if  The  old  Colonial  Powder  Magazine  at  Williamsburg,  Virginia. 

Sir  Walter  Raleigh  to  search  for  remote 

heathen  lands  "  not  inhabited  by  Christian  people,"  and  granted  to  him  in  fee 
simple  "  all  the  soil  within  two  hundred  leagues  of  the  places  where  his  people 
should,  within  six  years,  make  their  dwellings  or  abidings,"  reserving  only,  to 
herself  and  her  successors,  his  allegiance  and  one-fifth  of  all  the  gold  and  silver 


624 


raleigh's    colonial    schemes 


he  should  obtain.     Sir  Walter  at  once  sent  out  two  ships,  which  visited  Wococan 

Island,  in  North  Carolina,  and  the  next  year  he  dispatched  seven  ships,  with  107 

men,  who  settled  on  Roanoke  Island.     The   Indians  there  soon  acknowledged 

themselves  the  homagers 

'  .*     I     \  ,  .,_  of  the    brave    Sir   Walter, 

z     '      kK  .        -  ~       ~  and   in    1586  and   1587  he 

"::r   Jgjl|  "    "%  WE  58^=,  sent  a  Governor,  with  twelve 

assistants  and  a  charter 
of  incorporation,  instruct- 
ing them  to  settle  on  Ches- 
apeake Bay.  They  landed, 
however,  at  "Hattorask," 
now  known  as  Hatteras. 
In  1588,  when  a  fleet  was 
ready  to  sail  with  a  new 
supply  of  colonists  and 
supplies,  it  was  detained 
in  English  ports  by  Queen 
Elizabeth  to  assist  against 
the  Spanish  Armada;  and 
Sir  Walter,  who  had  ex- 
pended .£40,000  in  these 

enterprises,  was  obliged  to  get  others  to  adventure  their  money.     In  1589,  he 

therefore  deeded  to  other  colonists  the  liberty  of  trade  to  his  new  country  free 

from  all  taxes  for  seven  years,  excepting  the  fifth  part  of  the  gold  and  silver  ore 

due  the   Queen.      At   different  times 

thereafter,  however,  he  sent  off  fresh 

expeditions    to    the    American    coast, 

but  the  fate  of  the  last  colonists  sent 

hither  was    never   known,   and    Sir 

Walter  died   on    the    scaffold  without 

seeing    the    realization    of  his    bright 

dreams  of  a  new  empire  on  the  Amer- 
ican Continent 

Those  who  supposed  that  Raleigh's 

grant  was    forfeited   by  his    alleged 

treason    petitioned    King   James,    the 

successor  of  Elizabeth,  for  a  new  grant 

of  Virginia  to  them.     It  was  executed 

to  Sir  Thomas  Gates  and  others,  and 

in    1607  a  settlement  was  effected  at 


The  old  Church  of  Bruton  Parish — Williamsburg,  Virginia.     [Page  622.] 


'**<- 


Cornwallis's  Cave,  near  Yorktown,  Virginia.     [Page  623.] 


Jamestown,  on  the  river  James.  This  grant  "  was  superseded  by  letters  patent 
of  the  same  King  in  1609  to  the  Earl  of  Salisbury  and  others,  incorporating  them 
by  the  name  of  '  The  Treasurer  and  Company  of  Adventurers  and  Planters  of 
the  City  of  London  for  the  First  Colony  of  Virginia ;  '  granting  to  them  and 


ENGLISH     IMPOSITIONS     UPON     VIRGINIA.  625 

their  successors  all  the  lands  in  Virginia  from  Point  Comfort  along  the  sea- 
coast  to  the  northward  two  hundred  miles,  and  from  the  same  point  along  the 
sea-coast  to  the  southward  two  hundred  miles,  and  all  the  space  from  this  pre- 
cinct on  the  sea- coast  up  into  the  land,  west  and  north-west,  from  sea  to  sea,  to- 
gether with  the  islands  within  ioo  miles  of  it."    This  grant  was  added  to  in  1612. 

In  1 62 1  this  Company  established  two  Supreme  Councils  in  Virginia,  one 
called  "The  Council  of  State,"  the  other  "The  General  Assembly,"  to  be 
convened  by  the  Governor  once  yearly  or  oftener,  the  latter  body  to  consist 
of  the  Council  of  State  and  two  burgesses  out  of  every  town,  hundred,  or 
plantation,  to  be  chosen  by  the  inhabitants.  In  due  time  King  James  and 
"  The  Company  of  Adventurers "  quarreled,  and  the  latter's  powers  were 
superseded  by  a  proclamation  in  1624.  As  Charles  I.  then  took  the  govern- 
ment of  England,  the  colonists  of  Virginia  passed  under  his  control,  and  in  this 
they  heartily  accorded,  loving  and  admiring  the  cavalier  King. 

But  presently  the  northern  parts  of  their  colony  were  granted  away  to  Lords 
Baltimore  and  Fairfax,  the  first  of  whom  also  obtained  the  rights  of  separate 
jurisdiction  and  government.  After  the  deposition  of  Charles  I.,  the  English 
Parliament,  standing  in  the  deposed  King's  stead,  began  to  tyrannize  over  the 
colony  and  to  impose  grievous  restrictions  upon  it.  But  the  Virginian  colonists 
had,  from  the  first,  maintained  a  vigorous  opposition  to  Cromwell  and  the  Parlia- 
ment, and  did  not  lay  down  their  arms  until,  as  they  fancied,  they  had  secured 
their  rights  by  a  solemn  covenant  with  the  deputies  from  Parliament.  These 
rights,  which,  with  arms  in  their  hands,  they  sternly  insisted  upon,  were  that 
Virginia's  ancient  limits  should  be  restored  to  her ;  that  the  colony  should  be 
freed  from  all  taxes  and  impositions ;  that  the  colonists  should  have  all  the  rights 
of  free-born  Britons ;  that  the  Assembly  should  convene  as  formerly,  and  that 
trade  should  be  free.  Every  one  of  these  rights,  so  strongly  insisted  upon,  was 
subsequently  violated  by  English  kings  and  parliaments.  "  The  General  Assem- 
bly was  split  into  two  houses ;  appeals  from  their  Supreme  Court,  which  had 
been  fixed  by  law  in  that  Assembly,  were  arbitrarily  revoked  to  England,  to  be 
there  heard  before  the  King  and  Council."*  The  colony  saw  its  sea-coast  re- 
duced in  thirty  years  from  400  to  100  miles;  its  foreign  trade  was  suppressed; 
and  the  gradual  restriction  and  oppression  practised  by  England,  under  the  long 
line  of  royal  governors,  and  the  intolerable  grants  of  land  made  to  the  detriment 
of  the  colonists  after  the  Restoration,  finally  resulted  in  the  Virginia  phase  of  the 
revolution  which  became  so  general  throughout  America.  England  lost  a  proud 
domain  when  the  Virginians  were  alienated  from  her.  The  State  which  pro- 
duced Marshall,  Madison,  Monroe,  Mason,  Nicholas,  Henry,  Randolph,  Lee, 
Pendleton,  Washington,  Wythe,  and  other  members  of  the  Convention  which 
assembled  in  Richmond  in  June,  1788,  to  ratify  the  Federal  Constitution,  deserved 
deference  and  generous  treatment  rather  than  oppression  and  abuse.  Time  was 
when  England,  Scotland,  Ireland,  and  Virginia  had  their  arms  quartered  on  the 
same  shield. 

*  Jefferson's  "  Notes  on  Virginia." 


RICHMOND  —  ITS     TRADE     AND     CHARACTER. 

THE  view  of  the  Virginian  capital  as  one  approaches  it  on  the  James  river,  is 
singularly  fine.  One  gains  the  impression  that  Richmond  is  an  immense 
metropolis,  the  hills  seem  so  packed  with  streets  lined  on  either  side  with  solid 
blocks  of  stone  and  brick.  From  the  ample  foliage  peep  church-spires  and 
towers,  and  the  roofs  of  spacious  mansions  are  seen  on  Cary,  Main,  Franklin, 
Grace,  Marshall,  Clay  and  Leigh  streets,  and  in  the  pretty  suburbs  of  "  Chim- 


View  of  Richmond,  Virginia,  from  the  Manchester  side  of  the  James  River. 

borazo"  and  Union,  Church  and  Navy,  Gamble's  and  Libby's  Hills.  The 
splendid  steamers  of  the  Old  Dominion  Company,  which  controls  the  line  between 
New  York  and  Richmond,  ply  slowly  along  the  stream  through  the  level  plains 
bordered  with  forests,  and  give  one  ample  time  to  study  the  city  which  was  so 
lately  the  Confederate  capital.  Its  grouping  of  houses  and  streets,  seen  at  a 
distance,  is  picturesque ;  as  one  approaches  it  the  ordinary  aspects  of  an  Ameri- 
can city  appear  in  their  customary  prosaic  form. 

One  is  not  sorry  to  see  hills  again,  after  the  lowlands  of  the  serpentine  James, 
and  he  climbs  with  gusto  the  steep  streets  leading  to  the  Capitol,  whence  he  can 
get  a  look  over  the  broad  plains  beyond  the  stream.  A  few  years  ago  the 
dwellers  in  Richmond  watched  those  plains  with  keenest  anxiety,  when  cannon 
thundered  and  battles  were  fought  in  the  forests  and  along  the  roads.  The 
traveler  remembers  that  he  saw  many  church-spires  in  the  vicinity  of  the  Capitol 


THE     PANORAMA      OF     RICHMOND SHOCKOE      HILL. 


627 


Libby  Prison  —  Richmond,  Virginia. 


as  he  looked  at  the  city  from  the  river ;  from  Capitol  Square  he  can  hardly 
distinguish  them,  they  are  so  concealed,  save  their  very  tops,  by  the  ample  foliage. 
From  the  front  porch  he  can  look  down  upon  the  James,  flowing  hurriedly 
through  the  city  over  a  rocky  bed  which  makes  Richmond  the  head  of  naviga- 
tion; and  can  note  the  barges  clustered  about  the  flour- mills,  and  the  groups  of 
negroes  at  the  doors  of  the  tobacco  warehouses.  The  State  Penitentiary's  white- 
washed walls,  on  a  neighboring  hill,  --  _  _ 
form  a  group  as  picturesque  as  an  =1111  -  - .'  =  JfjjjL 
Italian  monastery.  On  the  Richmond  _-„  Bjgy^ 
bank  of  the  river  the  immense  array 
of  shops,  known  as  the  Tredegar  Iron 
Works,  lies  half- concealed  beneath 
clouds  of  smoke,  and  beyond  them  are 
the  "  Old  Dominion  Nail  Works,"  on 
the  famous  "  Belle  Isle,"  where  Fed- 
eral prisoners  were  confined  during 
the  war.  Manchester,  on  the  oppo- 
site side  of  the  stream,  is  a  thriving 
village,  with  two  fine  cotton -mills 
employing  three  hundred  workers,  and  with  many  neat  houses,  which  testify  to  the 
prosperity  of  the  villagers.  Farther  down  the  James,  one  can  see  the  unsightly 
group  of  buildings  around  the  low,  dirty- looking,  ancient  edifice,  known  as 
"  Libby  Prison."  Not  far  away,  on  the  opposite  side  of  the  street,  is  the  famous 
"  Castle  Thunder."  These  once  noted  prisons,  whose  walls  are  covered  with  the 
names  of  the  hapless  Union  officers  who  sweltered  and  starved  in  them  during 
the  civil  war,  have  been  relegated  to  their  previous  condition  of  tobacco  ware- 
houses. 

At  the  foot  of  the  hill  occupied  by  Capitol  Square  stands  the  pretty  Custom- 
House,  built  in  the  Italian  style  from  the  granite  of  which  inexhaustible  beds  lie 
all  around  Richmond.  From  the  Square,  avenues  running  down  toward  the  river 
open  into  Main  street,  a  broad  business  thoroughfare,  extending  along  the  hills 
and  into  the  valleys,  and  lined  with  the  principal  shops,  banks  and  offices  of  the 
town.  Below  Main,  on  all  the  streets  by  the  river-side,  are  located  the  wholesale 
establishments,  the  manufactories,  and  the  warehouses.  A  vacant  spot  here  and 
there,  blackened  by  fire,  is  the  only  reminder  of  the  great  conflagration  which 
ran  riot  for  a  mile  through  the  business  section  of  the  city  on  the  night  when  the 
Confederates  were  forced  to  evacuate  the  capital  which  they  had  defended  so 
long  and  so  well.  Richmond  lost  a  thousand  buildings  in  that  fire ;  but  now 
builds  half  as  many  every  year.  In  1873,  the  city  expended  a  million  and  a- 
half  dollars  in  the  erection  of  ne*v  edifices. 

"  Shockoe  Hill,"  on  which  the  Capitol  stands,  is  a  goodly  eminence.  Its 
picturesque  height  was  so  attractive  to  the  eyes  of  old  Colonel  Byrd,  of  West- 
over,  in  1733,  that  he  decided  to  lay  the  "  foundation  of  a  large  city  there."  He 
had  found  a  promising  site  for  another  metropolis  at  the  falls  of  the  Appomattox 
river,  where  Petersburg  stands,  and  recorded  in  his  diary  that  Richmond  and 


628 


THE      CAPITOL STATUE      OF     WASHINGTON. 


Petersburg,  being  the  uppermost  landings  of  James  and  Appomattox  rivers, 
"  were  naturally  intended  for  marts  where  the  traffic  of  the  outer  inhabitants 
must  centre."  The  good  Colonel's  judgment  has  been  proved  accurate. 
"  Shockoe's "  height  was  once  furrowed  by  deep  ravines  on  either  side,  and 
weeds  flourished  where  now  dainty  flower-beds  and  trim  lawns  delight  the  eye. 
The  modest  three-story  wooden  house  in  which  Henry  and  Jefferson,  when 
Governors  of  Virginia,  lived,  has  been  succeeded  by  a  handsome  "  Executive 
Mansion."  The  Capitol  itself,  modeled,  according  to  Thomas  Jefferson's  sug- 
gestion, after  the  celebrated  Maison  Carre  at  Nismes,  in  France,  has  an  imposing 
front,  but  is  insecure  and  insufficient  for  the  uses  of  a  great  commonwealth.  A 
horrible  accident  occurred  in  the  building  in  April  of  1870,  by  which  over  fifty 


Capitol  Square,  with  a  view  of  the  Washington  Monument  —  Richmond,  Virginia. 

people  were  killed  and  hundreds  were  wounded.  The  flooring  of  the  room 
situated  directly  above  the  Hall  of  the  House  of  Delegates,  and  used  as  the 
Court  of  Appeals,  gave  way,  and  precipitated  a  large  audience,  gathered  to  hear 
the  decision  of  an  important  case,  into  the  legislative  chamber. 

The  Capitol  contains  the  celebrated  statue  0/  Washington,  by  Houdon,  made 
in  1788,  and  erected  in  the  same  year  by  the  grateful  State,  which  would  not 
wait  until  its  hero  was  dead  before  it  deigned  to  honor  his  deeds.  In  the  square 
"hall  of  entrance,"  where  this  statue  stands,  there  are  also  a  marble  bust  of 
Lafayette,  and  an  antique  English  stove,  used  to  warm  the  House  of  Burgesses 
at  Williamsburg  in  colonial  days.      The  stove  is  three  stories  high,  and  when 


THE     WASHINGTON      MONUMENT HISTORIC     CHURCHES. 


629 


sent  to  the  Colonies  its  founder,  Buzaglo,  wrote  concerning  it :  "  The  elegance 
of  the  workmanship  does  honor  to  Great  Britain.  It  excels  in  grandeur  any- 
thing ever  seen  of  the  kind,  and  is  a  masterpiece  not  to  be  equaled  in  all 
Europe."  It  was  given  to  the  House  of  Burgesses  by  the  Duke  of  Beaufort, 
and  is  the  most  interesting  of  colonial  memorials,  except  the  chair  in  which  the 
Speaker  of  the  House  of  Burgesses  once  sat,  and  which  is  now  in  the  Capitol. 
A  fine  portrait  of  General  Lee,  by  Elder,  graces  the  Hall  of  Delegates.  The 
only  bronze  statue  which  Richmond  possesses  is  the  most  remarkable  in  the 
United  States.  It  is  the  equestrian  statue  of  Washington,  upon  which  Crawford 
lavished  so  much  labor,  and  in  which  his  splendid  genius  shines  more  con- 
spicuously than  in  any  other  of  his  works.  The  statue,  completed  by  Randolph 
Rogers,  stands  on  the  esplanade  leading  from  the  Governor's  house  to  the  west 
gate  of  the  Capitol  Square.  Around  the  colossal  Washington,  mounted  on 
a  finely  modeled  horse,  which  seems  vaulting  airily  from  a  massive  pedestal  of 
granite,  stand  bronze  figures  of  Patrick  Henry;  Thomas  Jefferson;  John  Mar- 
shall, one  of  the  bravest  fighters  in  the  Revolution,  as  well  as  a  most  illustrious 
Chief- Justice  of  the  United  States;  Andrew  Lewis,  one  of  the  giants  who  sup- 
ported Washington  in  the  earliest  struggles  against  Great  Britain ;  George 
Mason,  author  of  the  Virginia  "Bill  of  Rights;"  and  Thomas  Nelson,  a  Governor 
of  the  old  commonwealth 
during  the  Revolution  and  a 
brilliant  soldier.  Around  the 
lower  pediments  military  and 
civic  decorations  are  em- 
blazoned in  bronze.  The 
Capitol  Square  also  contains 
a  marble  statue  of  Henry 
Clay.  Northward  from  the 
square  is  the  City  Hall,  and 
not  far  from  it  the  stately 
mansion  which  Jefferson 
Davis  chose  for  his  residence 
when  Richmond  was  the 
Confederate  capital.  Near  at 
hand  is  St.  Paul's  Church,  in 
which  Davis  was  seated  at 
worship  when  the  messenger 
brought  him  the  fatal  news 
of  the  final  disaster  to  Lee's 
army,  and  the  necessity  of 
flight  from  Richmond. 

There  are  three  churches 
in  the  Virginian  capital  which  possess  especial  interest  for  the  traveler.  One  of 
them,  St.  John's,  dates  from  before  the  Revolution,  and  is  celebrated  as  the 
edifice  in  which  Patrick  Henry  uttered  his  immortal  words— "  Give  me  liberty 


St.  John's  Church  —  Richmond,  Virginia. 


630 


THE     OLD     AFRICAN     CHURCH HOLLYWOOD. 


or  give  me  death ! "  Modern  improvements  are  crowding  thickly  around  this 
venerable  structure,  which  was  also  filled,  long  after  the  Revolution  had  been 
successful,  by  the  delegates  that  Virginia  sent  up  to  Richmond  to  ratify  the 
Federal  Constitution.     The  second  church  is  a  long,  low  building  on  steep  Broad 


View  on  the  James  River,  Richmond,  Virginia. 

street.  It  is  known  as  the  "Old  Afri- 
can," and  is  crowded  on  Sundays  with 
the  dusky  population    of  the   negro 

quarters.  During  the  late  war,  and  the  troublous  times  following  it,  this  humble 
but  spacious  building  was  the  scene  of  many  tumultuous  political  gatherings. 
Now-a-days  the  white  visitor,  unobtrusively  seating  himself  in  one  of  the  rear 
pews,  can  look  over  a  vast  congregation  of  blacks  listening  with  tearful  and 
rapt  attention  to  the  emotional  discourse  of  their  preacher,  or  singing  wild 
hymns,  as  they  are  read  out,  line  by  line,  by  the  deacon.  The  singing  is  one  of 
the  most  remarkable  features  in  all  the  African  churches  in  Richmond ;  every  one 
joins  in  it,  and  it  is  not  uncommon  to  see  the  churches  so  crowded  that  the 
doors  are  blockaded,  the  worshipers  obstructing  even  the  sidewalks,  as  they 
unite  with  enthusiasm  in  the  simple  yet  really  beautiful  service. 

The  third  noticeable  church  is  the  Monumental,  built  on  the  spot  on  Broad 
street  where,  in  1811,  the  Richmond  Theatre  took  fire  during  an  evening  per- 
formance, and  a  great  number  of  the  most  beautiful  women  and  eminent  men 
in  the  State,  including  the  Governor  and  other  personages  of  distinction,  were 
burned  and  crushed  to  death. 

Richmond's  principal  cemetery,  Hollywood;  has  long  been  noted  as  one  of 
the  most  lovely  in  the  South.  'It  occupies  a  wide  tract  in  the  western  limits 
of  the  city,  picturesquely  broken  into  hill  and  dale,  and  decorated  with  prettiest 
of  shrubs  and  flowers.  From  a  slope  in  the  cemetery  one  gets  a  fine  outlook 
over  the  winding  James  river  and  Kanawha  Valley  canal;  on  the  fretted  cur- 
rent of  the  James  river  itself,  with  its  waterfalls  and  clusters  of  green  islets;  and 
on  the  northern  and  eastern  hills  of  the  city,  covered  with  masses  of  well- 
grouped  buildings  and  remnants  of  fortifications.  In  the  southern  section  of 
the  cemetery  stands  the  tomb  of  President  Monroe,  whose  remains  were 
escorted  to  Richmond  from  New  York  by  the  Seventh  Regiment  several  years 
before  that  noted  organization  had  any  idea  that  it  would  ever  make  a  hostile 
incursion  into  the  "Old  Dominion."      From  the  hill  one  can  see  the  ruins  of 


THE      CONFEDERATE      DEAD RICHMOND    S      TRADE. 


631 


Monument  to  the  Confederate  Dead — Richmond,  Virginia. 


the  old  State  Armory  near  the  canal.      The   Confederates   used  it  during  the 
war,  and   when  the  evacuation  of   Richmond    was  ordered,    the    Armory    was 

swept    away    in    the    conflagration 
kindled  by  the  retreating  army. 

In  the  soldiers'  section  are  the 
graves  of  hundreds  of  Confederate 
dead,  and  from  the  centre  of  this  tract 
springs  a  rough  stone  pyramid,  which 
the  clinging  ivy  is  gradually  clothing 
in  green.  Soldiers  from  all  the 
Southern  States  are  buried  under  the 
shadow  of  this  pyramid,  and  late  in 
the  month  of  May,  a  few  days  before 
the  North  observes  the  ceremonies  of 
Decoration,  the  gray- coated  veterans 
and  the  militia  regiments  parade  in  solemn  procession  to  the  cemetery,  and 
thousands  of  ladies  dressed  in  black  wander  silently  and  tearfully  among  the 
graves.  There. are  rarely  any  speeches  ;  there  is  no  display  of  flags  and  em- 
blems of  the  lost  cause ;  the  grief  is  too  deep  for  words,  too  sacred  to  be  asso- 
ciated with  the  vulgar  details  of  politics. 

Richmond  is  chief  among  Virginia  cities,  no  less  because  of  its  proud  posi- 
tion as  the  capital  than  because  of  its  enterprise  and  its  rapid  growth.  It  now 
has  nearly  fifty-five  thousand  inhabitants,  and  its  population  is  steadily  increas- 
ing. The  total  assessed  __ . 
value  of  its  real  estate  and 
personal  property  amounts  to 
$37,000,000.  Its  exports 
amounted  in  the  year  1873 
to  $3,026,492,  an  increase  in 
one  year  of  $1,026,123;  its 
trade  with  other  countries,  to 
which  it  sends  wheat,  flour, 
leaf  and  manufactured  tobacco, 
resin,  lard,  stoves,  and  furni- 
ture, is  steadily  increasing. 
The  aggregate  product  of  the 
manufactories  in  the  city  in 
1872  was  $16,199,870.  The 
most  important  and  oldest  in- 
dustries of  the  town  are  the 
manufacture  of  chewing  to- 
bacco and  the  milling  of  flour. 
The  Gallego  flour-mill,  which  produces  fifteen  hundred  barrels  daily,  has  a 
monopoly  of  the  Rio  de  Janeiro  and  Australian  trade,  where  the  Richmond 
flour  is  preferred  to  all  others,  because  it  suffers  no  injury  from  transportation 


The  Gallego  Flouring- Mill — Richmond,  Virginia. 


632 


THE      FLOUR     AND      TOBACCO     TRADE. 


through  the  hot  latitudes  near  the  equator.  From  "  Rockitt's,"  the  "port"  of 
Richmond,  on  the  James,  thousands  of  barrels  of  flour  are  weekly  carried  away 
in  small  sailing  vessels,  which  ply  constantly  between  Brazil  and  Virginia,  bring- 
ing coffee  on  their  trips  to  America.  Richmond  was,  up  to  i860,  the  third 
coffee  mart  in  the  United  States,  and  will  perhaps  be  the  first  when  her  Western 
connections  have  been  so  perfected  that  wheat  enough  to  supply  the  hoppers 
of  the    flour-mills  can   be  obtained,  and    the   commerce  with    South  America 


assumes  the    mammoth  proportions  it 
promises  some  day  to  take.     The  city 
suffered  the  loss  of  one  of  its  largest 
flour-mills  by  fire  a  year  since ;    but 
the    citizens    propose    speedily    to    re- 
place it  by  another  and  ampler  one.     The  present  Gallego  mill  has  twice  arisen 
from  the  ruins  caused  by  conflagrations.     This  mill  was  owned  successively  by 
Mr.  Gallego  and  Mr.  Chevallie,  both  accomplished  Frenchmen,  the  latter  being 
especially  distinguished  for  his  literary  culture  and  his  courtly  manners. 

The  tobacco  trade  of  Richmond  has  long  been  of  great  importance  to  the 
city,  and  is  one  of  the  mainstays  of  its  commerce.  The  trade  is  by  no  means 
as  large  as  it  was  before  the  war,  when  slave  labor  made  a  mammoth  production 


GOSSIP     ABOUT     TOBACCO. 


*   633 


more  certain  than  now,  and  when  there  was  no  revenue  officer  with  vigilant  eyes 
in  every  town.     There  are  at  present  in  Richmond  about  forty-five  tobacco  fac- 


Tobacco  Culture — Stringing  the  Primings. 

tories  in  operation,  each  employing  from  fifty  to  two  hundred  hands,  and  each 
producing  from  fifteen  hundred  to  twenty  thousand  pounds  of  manufactured  to- 
bacco daily.  The  revenue  which  this  article  pays  to  the  General  Government  is 
enormous.  The  collections  of  internal  revenue  for  the  year  1872  in  the  Rich- 
mond district  of  Virginia  averaged  a  quarter  of  a  million  dollars  monthly ;  and 
during  the  year  amounted  to  more  than  three  million  dollars.  While  the  reve- 
nue collected  from  the  tax  on 
ardent  spirits  in  the  Rich- 
mond district  in  1873  was  but 
$34,476,  that  on  tobacco  was 
$3,064,293,  many  hundred 
times  more  than  the  amounts 
collected  there  by  the  General 
Government  from  all  other 
sources.  The  collections  in 
that  district  from  the  various 
taxable  articles  since  May  1, 
1869,  amount  to  $12,251,537. 
When  the  tobacco  comes 
from  the  plantations  through- 
out Virginia  and  North  Caro- 
lina to  the  Richmond  market,  A  Tobacco  Bam  in  Virginia. 
it  is  first  taken  to  some  of  the  great  warehouses  on  the  border  of  the  James, 
where  it  remains  until  the  commission  merchants  to  whom  it  is  consigned  desire 


634* 


INSPECTION   AND   SALE   OF   TOBACCO. 


to  dispose  of  it.  It  is  then  "sampled"  by  a  sworn  State  Inspector,  who  is 
responsible  for  the  quality  of  each  package  from  which  he  takes  a  sample.  The 
"samples"  are  carried  to  the-  "Tobacco  Exchange,"  where  they  are  exposed 
for  sale,  either  to  private  parties  or  at  public  auction.  There  are  annually 
inspected  in  the  Richmond  warehouses  from  40,000  to  45,000  hogsheads,  or 
more  than  three-fourths  of  the  entire  crop  of  the  State.  The  finest  grades  of 
tobacco  come  from  Halifax  and  Charlotte  counties  in  Virginia,  and  from  Gran- 
ville and  Caswell  counties  in  North  Carolina.  The  tobacco  leaf  is  the  most 
troublesome  as  well  as  the  most  remunerative  staple '  which  the  Virginian 
planter  can  raise.     The  old  ex- slaveholders  are  wont  to  moan  bitterly  over  the 


The  Old  Method  of  Getting  Tobacco  to  Market. 

>oss  of  the  good  old  days  when  there  were  from  six  hundred  to  a  thousand  slaves 
upon  a  tobacco  plantation,  and  when  the  lands  were  taxed  almost  beyond  the 
limits  of  their  strength  that  the  greatest  possible  results  might  be  secured.  But 
now-a-days  the  work  that  previous  to  i860  was  done  on  one  plantation  is  divided 
between  a  hundred  "landed  proprietors."  * 

The  Richmond  dealers  cluster  daily  around  the  Tobacco  Exchange,  where 
they  find  an  epitome  of  the  whole  tobacco  production  of  the  State  neatly 
arranged  in  samples.  Hundreds  of  negroes  toil  in  the  warehouses,  as  in  Lynch- 
burg and  Petersburg,  opening  the  hogsheads  for  the  inspectors,  and  arranging  the 

*  In  1873  there  were  inspected  in  Richmond  42,054  hogsheads,  8,201  tierces,  and  1,218 
boxes,  besides  2,834,100  pounds  of  loose  tobacco.  The  latter  is  mainly  grown  within  a  radius 
of  forty  miles  from  Richmond,  and  is  brought  to  market  in  wagons.  The  Tobacco  Exchange, 
started  as  a  private  speculation  in  1857  by  William  Y.  Sheppard,  Esq.,  has  now  passed  into  the 
hands  of  tlje  tobacco  trade. 


THE     WATER     POWER     OF      RICHMOND. 


635 


lots.  Half  a  century  ago  the  tobacco  warehouses  in  Richmond  were  mere 
wooden  sheds ;  the  cask  containing  the  weed  was  rolled  to  these  warehouses 
on  its  own  periphery.  The  rough  farmers  who  had  spent  a  whole  season  in  cul- 
tivating a  crop  packed  it  tightly  into  a  cask,  then  drove  a  long  wooden  spike  into 
the  centre  of  each  end  of  the  compressed  mass.  This  served  as  an  axletree ;  a 
split  sapling  was  transformed  into  a  pair  of  shafts,  rude  tires  were  placed  around 
each  end  of  the  cask,  and  a  stout  horse  and  a  steer  trundled  this  extempore 
wagon  to  the  capital,  where  its  contents  were  inspected,  and  then  sold.  Near 
each  warehouse  stood  a  furnace,  into  which  all  tobacco  unfit  for  exportation 
was  thrown  to  be  burned. 

The  water  power  of  Richmond  is  not  quite  so  limitless  as  an  enthusiastic 
Virginian  once  declared  it,  viz. :  "  Sufficient  to  run  all  the  machinery  in  the 
New  England  States;"  but  the  best  authorities  have  pronounced  the  available 
power  very  large,  certainly  much  ampler  than  the  entire  mill  privileges  combined 
of  Lowell  and  Lawrence  in  Massachusetts.  There  is  enough  for  three  or  four 
times  as  many  manufactories  as  are  now  established  along  the  James  at  Rich- 
mond and  Manchester,  and  within  a  short  distance  of  this  power  ships  drawing 
thirteen  feet  of  water  can  come  at  all  seasons  of  the  year.  The  prominent 
citizens  of  Richmond  are  anxious  for  the  establishment  of  more  cotton-mills  on 
the  James;  and  it  is  possible  that  in  future  the  Virginia  capital  will  become 
the  rival  of  Fall  River  and  Lowell.  The  present  ratio  of  increase  in  the 
value    of  products   manufactured  in  the  city  is  certainly  as  rapid  as  could  be 


jfcr^ 


Getting  a  Tobacco  Hogshead  Ready  for  Market. 


expected  after  the  trials  undergone  by  Virginia  during  the  last  decade.     The 
tobacco  factories,  the  iron  works,  and  the  flour-mills  showed  a  product  amount- 
ing to   twelve  million  dollars  in    1873;    and  the  manufacturers  of  agricultural 
41 


636 


AN      IMPORTANT     CENTRE      FOR     MANUFACTURES. 


implements,  of  fertilizers,  the  preparers  of  sumac,  the  makers  of  clothing", 
paper,  and  a  hundred  miscellaneous  articles,  are  all  prosperous  and  active. 
The  receipts  of  corn,  of  wheat,  of  coal  and  iron  are  increasing  immensely 
from  year  to  year  as  the  Western  railroad  connections  are  perfected  and  the 

mineral  deposits  in  the 
mountains  are  unearth- 
ed. *  The  Tredegar  Iron 
Works  now  employs  a 
million  dollars  capital 
and  two  thousand  work- 
men ;  its  buildings  cover 
fifteen  acres,  and  it  an- 
nually works  up  tens  of 
thousands  of  tons  of 
crude  iron. 

There  seems  but  little 
doubt  that  Richmond 
will  become  one  of  the 
most  important  Southern 
centres  of  iron  manufac- 
ture. Now  that  the  Vir- 
ginian has  learned  to  as- 
pire to  something  besides 
"land  and  negroes,"  and 
that  new  railroads  enable 
him  to  utilize  the  im- 
mense coal  and  iron  de- 
posits of  the  common- 
wealth, it  is  reasonable  to  believe  that  he  will  improve  his  opportunities,  and  will 
make  of  the  pretty  capital  on  the  James  one  of  the  most  prosperous  of  manufac- 
turing towns.  The  Richmond,  Piedmont,  Dan  River,  and  New  River  coal-fields 
will  add  their  stores  to  those  of  the  mighty  Kanawha  valley;  and  the  iron  region 

*  Leading  articles  brought  into  Richmond  during  three  fiscal  years,  ending  September  30th 


Scene  on  a  Tobacco  Plantation  —  Finding  Tobacco- Worms. 


of  each  year:  l8?I>  l8?^ 

Coal,  tons 31,220     59, l8f 

Corn,  bushels 107,456     133, 6gt 


Fish,  barrels 7,824 

Guano,   tons .      1,901 

Hay,    bales i,744 

Ice,   tons 7,817 

Iron,  tons 

Lime,  barrels 28,834 


8,iS3 
5,5°7 
3,8i5 
8,994 
36,225 
18,389 


1873- 
64,916 
209,225 
5,819 

i3>i79 

12,248 

9,101 

21,519 

17,523 


Lumber,    feet 5,005,000  6,771,000  6,474,419 

Plaster,  tons 4,916  i,9°3  1,208 

Salt,    sacks 64,798  66,773  52,23° 

Shingles 1,272,000  2,252,000  2,353,000 

Wheat,  bushels 239,213  185,383  174,355 


THE     GROWTH     OF     RICHMOND. 


637 


!■•' 


which  Richmond  can  draw  upon  is 
very  extensive.  Louisa,  Spottsyl- 
vania,  Albemarle,  Nelson,  Amherst, 
Fluvanna,  Powhatan,  Cumberland, 
Buckingham,  Campbell  and  Appo- 
mattox counties  possess  fine  depos- 
its of  iron  ores ;  and  as  furnaces 
spring  up  in  those  sections,  the  capi- 
tal will  give  added  attention  to  the 
manufacture  of  iron.  As  the  mineral 
development  of  South-eastern  Mis- 
souri has  aided  in  building  up  St. 
Louis,  so  will  the  unearthing  of  the 
treasures  in  that  part  of  Virginia 
tributary  to  Richmond  give  that  city 
added  strength  and  size.  The  re- 
sources of  the  hematite  beds  of 
Augusta,  Rockbridge,  Bath  and  Al- 
leghany counties,  can  be  readily 
united  at  Richmond  with  those  of 
the  Kanawha  coal-seams.  It  is  safe 
to  predict  that  in  a  generation  the 
whole  character  of  the  city  will  be 
changed  ;  that  it  will  have  become  a 
sprightly  centre,  devoted  to  manu- 
factures, and  filled  with  huge  estab- 
lishments for  turning  raw  cotton, 
crude  tobacco,  and  pig-iron  into 
serviceable  articles.  In  twenty  years 
manufacturers  will  be  the  aristocrats 
in  Virginia.  What  planter  of  the 
Old  Dominion  twenty  years  ago 
would  have  believed  such  a  thing 
possible  ? 

The  rapid  growth  of  Richmond 
doubtless  carries  sadness  to  the  heart 
of  the  Virginian  of  the  old  school. 
For  in  the  steady  progress  of  the 
capital  toward  prominence  as  a 
manufacturing  centre  he  sees  the 
symbol  of  the  decay  of  the  society 
which  produced  him  and  his.  He 
hates  large  cities,  with  their  demo- 
cratic tendencies,  their  corruption, 
and  their  ambitious  populations.    He 


638'  RICHMOND     SCHOOLS. 

looks  upon  the  rich  manufacturer  as  a'  parvenu  ;  the  lordly  agriculturist  is  still, 
in  his  mind,  the  only  fitting  type  of  the  real  aristocrat.  He  shudders  when 
he  sees  the  youth  of  the  new  school  engaging  in  commerce,  buying  and  selling 
mines,  talking  of  opening  new  railroad  routes,  and  building  cotton-mills.  He 
flies  to  the  farthest  corner  of  the  lands  that  have  been  spared  to  him  out  of  the 
wrecks  caused  by  the  war,  and  strives  to  forget  the  present,  and  to  live  as 
he  did  "  before  the  surrender,"  like  a  country  squire  in  England  two  hundred 
years  ago. 

Richmond,  in  the  conduct  of  her  schools,  does  not  belie  the  reputation  for 
advanced  progress  in  education  which  Virginia  has  gained.  In  April  of  1869 
her  citizens  of  all  parties  petitioned  the  City  Council  for  a  system  of  public 
schools,  and  in  due  time  a  school  ordinance  was  adopted,  and  a  Board  of  Educa- 
tion was  appointed.  To  the  insufficient  appropriation  made  by  the  city  authori- 
ties, generous  donations  from  the  Peabody  fund,  the  Freedmen's  Bureau  fund, 
and  Northern  educational  societies,  were  added,  and  fifty-two  schools,  with  a 
pupil  membership  of  twenty-four  hundred,  were  opened.  At  the  close  of  this 
first  session  the  citizens  voluntarily  agreed  to  continue  the  schools,  and  the  city 
took  control  of  those  for  black  and  white  alike.  In  the  season  of  1870-71,  the 
attendance  had  increased  to  3,300,  and  the  schools  of  the  city  were  finally  made 
a  part  of  the  State  system.  The  School  Board  turned  the  Davis  Mansion,  once 
the  "  White  House  "  of  the  Confederacy,  into  a  school  building. 

The  Richmond  schools  for  both  white  and  colored  pupils  rank  among  the 
best  in  the  country.  The  schools  are  grouped  in  houses  holding  six  hundred 
pupils  each,  and  are  divided  into  six  grades  of  primary  and  four  of  grammar, 
with  an  advanced  high  school  grade.  No  Virginian  living  in  Richmond  is  able 
to  say  that  his  children  cannot  receive  as  good  an  education  in  the  public  as  they 
can  obtain  in  private  schools.  In  1873  Richmond  had  fifty-five  schools  for  white 
and  thirty-two  for  colored  children,  and  expended  about  seventy  thousand  dol- 
lars in  supporting  them.  The  instruction  is  the  same  in  each,  and  competent 
white  teachers  are  employed  when  good  black  ones  are  lacking  for  the  colored 
schools.  No  one  thinks  of  refusing  to  aid  the  negro  in  obtaining  his  education, 
although  he  contributes  little  or  nothing  toward  the  school  tax. 

The  white  and  colored  normal  schools  of  Richmond  have  done  noble  work  in 
sending  out  well-equipped  teachers  to  encourage  the  growing  sentiment  in  the 
State  in  favor  of  universal  education  and  free  schools.  The  colored  normal 
school  was  incorporated  by  special  act  of  the  Virginia  Legislature,  and  opened  in 
1867.  It  is  supported  by  the  Freedmen's  Bureau  and  the  Peabody  fund.  It 
receives  pupils  mainly  from  the  city  public  schools,  and  gives  them  a  careful 
three  years'  course.  The  Richmond  Institute,  for  the  training  of  colored  preach- 
ers and  teachers,  is  a  protege  of  the  American  Baptist  Home  Mission  Society. 
The  Baptist  and  the  Virginia  Medical  Colleges,  located  in  Richmond,  are  flourish- 
ing institutions ;  and  there  are  more  than  a  score  of  well-conducted  private 
schools,  seminaries,  "  institutes,"  and  academies,  in  which  several  hundred  pupils 
are  annually  received. 


LXXI. 

THE    PARTITION     OF    VIRGINIA  —  RECONSTRUCTION     AND     POLITICS 
IN    WEST    AND    EAST     VIRGINIA. 

AT  the  time  of  the  secession  of  the  Cotton  States,  Virginia  was  apparently- 
attached  to  the  Union.  Shortly  after  that  secession,  at  an  extra  meeting 
of  the  Legislature,  a  State  Convention  was  called,  the  members  of  which  were 
to  be  elected  on  the  4th  of  February,  1861.  On  the  23d  of  January  of  the 
same  year,  a  bill  was  passed  appropriating  a  million  dollars  for  the  defense  of  the 
State,  and  Virginia  began  to  show  signs  of  adhesion  to  the  cause  of  the  South. 
The  Governor  sent  messages  to  the  Legislature,  in  which  hostility  to  the  North 
and  Northern  institutions  was  exhibited.  Ten  Virginia  members  of  Congress 
published  an  address  denouncing  the  Republican  party,  and  declaring  that  it  was 
vain  to  expect  reconciliation.  Many  of  the  delegates  elected  to  the  State  Con- 
vention were  conditional  Union  men ;  some  few  were  unconditional  in  their  sup- 
port; but  the  majority  avowed  the  doctrine  of  State  Rights,  condemned  inter- 
ference with  slavery,  asserted  the  right  of  secession,  and  defined  the  circumstances 
under  which  Virginia  would  be  justified  in  exercising  that  right.  These  circum- 
stances were  the  failure  to  procure  such  guarantees  from  the  Northern  States  as 
Virginia  demanded,  the  adoption  of  a  war  policy  by  the  General  Government, 
or  the  attempt  to  exact  payment  of  duty,  or  to  reinforce  or  capture  forts. 

On  the  17th  of  April,  1861,  after  the  call  of  the  President  for  troops,  the  ordi- 
nance of  secession  was  passed  by  88  to  55  votes.  War  measures  were  begun, 
and  on  the  25  th  of  April  the  Convention  passed  an  act  for  the  adoption  of  the 
Constitution  of  the  Provisional  Government  of  the  Confederate  States,  and  Vir- 
ginia was  fairly  out  of  the  Union. 

In  the  western  section  of  Virginia,  a  public  meeting  was  held  in  Clarksburg, 
in  Harrison  county,  on  the  28th  of  April,  1861,  to  decide  what  measures  should 
be  taken  in  view  of  the  recent  action  of  the  State.  Delegates  from  twenty-five 
counties  met  at  Wheeling,  condemned  secession,  and  provided  for  a  convention 
to  represent  all  the  counties  in  the  State  favorable  to  a  division  thereof,  in  case 
the  people  of  Virginia  ratified  the  ordinance  of  secession,  against  the  vote  of  the 
western  section.  The  popular  vote,  ratifying  the  secession  ordinance,  is  said  to 
have  given  94,000  majority  for  secession,  Eastern  Virginia  voting  solidly  for  and 
Western  Virginia  against  it. 

On  the  1  ith  of  June,  at  Wheeling,  the  Convention  of  West  Virginia,  represent- 
ing forty  counties,  passed  a  declaration  of  independence  from  the  action  of  the 
State  Convention,  and  took  measures  for  establishing  a  provisional  government. 
Later,  the  representatives  of  Western  Virginia  met  as  a  State  Legislature,  and 


64O.  WEST     VIRGINIA. 

elected  Senators  to  the  United  States  Congress,  passed  a  stay  law,  and  appro- 
priated $200,000  for  carrying  on  the  war,  and  the  same  amount  to  support  the 
new  Government.  The  proposition  for  a  division  of  the  State  was  voted  down, 
but  subsequently  the  Convention,  at  an  adjourned  session,  passed  an  ordinance 
organizing  the  western  counties  into  a  new  State  to  be  called  "  Kanawha." 
Thirty-nine  counties,  with  a  population  of  nearly  300,000  people,  thus  gave  in 
their  adhesion  to  the  Union. 

On  the  24th  of  October  the  Provisional  Legislature,  in  session  at  Wheeling, 
sanctioned  the  setting  off  of  the  new  State,  and  in  October  the  act  was  approved 
by  the  people  of  thirty-nine  counties  by  an  almost  unanimous  vote.  Western 
Virginia,  as  it  was  finally  decided  to  call  the  new  division,  applied  for  admission 
to  the  Union  at  the  first  regular  session  of  the  37th  Congress,  and  on  April  20th, 
1863,  after  the  Provisional  Legislature  had  ratified  an  amendment  to  the  Constitu- 
tion, permitting  free  negroes  to  enter  the  State,  and  inserting  certain  provisions 
relative  to  freeing  .the  slaves,  Western  Virginia  was  admitted  to  the  Union,  and 
the  new  State  was  inaugurated  at  Wheeling,  June  20th,  1863,  with  imposing 
ceremonies. 

Old  Virginia  thus  lost  one  of  the  fairest  portions  of  her  domain,  an  immense 
amount  of  material  resources,  a  mineral  region  almost  unequaled  upon  the  con- 
tinent, and  a  large  population. 

The  people  of  Western  Virginia  unanimously  adopted  their  new  Constitution 
in  a  Convention  comprising  66  Democrats  and  12  Republicans,  on  the  9th  of 
April,  1872.  The  Constitution  guarantees  West  Virginia  a  continued  separate 
existence,  secures  free  schools,  and  is,  withal,  quite  liberal,  although  some  mem- 
bers of  the  Convention  tried  to  have  the  negroes  deprived  of  their  newly-acquired 
right  to  vote.  It  also  recognizes  the  obligation  of  West  Virginia  for  whatever 
she  may  justly  owe  the  parent  State  as  her  share  in  the  latter's  debt  of  $44,000,- 
000,  and  declares  her  willingness  to  pay  it  when  it  is  properly  ascertained.  The 
new  Constitution  was  ratified  August  22d,  1872,  by  a  small  majority.  It  fixes 
the  term  of  the  office  of  Governor  and  other  important  State  officers  at  four 
years,  and  that  of  the  Judges  of  the  Supreme  Court  of  Appeals  at  twelve  years. 
The  Democrats,  in  1872,,  nominated  Johnson  M.  Camden,  of  Wood  county,  as 
Governor,  but  John  J.  Jacob,  the  then  incumbent,  was  re-elected  by  a  small 
majority. 

There  have  been  at  times,  serious  disagreements  between  the  Governor  and 
the  Legislature  of  the  State;  the  former  interpreting  the  Constitution  as  giving 
him  appointive  power  with  regard  to  almost  all  officers,  and  in  1873  these  disa- 
greements became  the  cause  of  quite  serious  disturbances  in  the  new  common- 
wealth. The  estimated  expenditures  of  the  State,  under  the  new  Constitution, 
are  somewhat  more  than  a  quarter  of  a  million  of  dollars  yearly^  to  which  may 
be  added  the  "State  fund,"  distributed  for  free  schools  in  1873,  amounting  to 
about  the  same  sum.  The  number  of  pupil-children  enrolled  in  that  year  was 
170,031,  of  which  about  one-half  attended  school.  The  University  of  Western 
Virginia^  under  the  exclusive  control  of  the  State,  has  a  permanent  endowment 
of  $100,000.     The  "Normal  Schools"  at  Fairmont,  West  Liberty,  Shepherds- 


RECONSTRUCTION     IN     VIRGINIA     PROPER.  6/j.I 

town,  and  Marshall  College  are  flourishing.  The  indebtedness  of  the  State  is  very 
slight ;  taxes  are  not  burdensome ;  the  State  institutions  are  well  maintained, 
and  the  present  population,  constantly  increased  by  immigration  of  excellent 
character,  mainly  from  the  middle  classes  of  England,  is  now  nearly  500,000. 

After  the  division  of  territory,  the  progress  of  reconstruction  in  Virginia 
proper  was  marked,  as  in  all  the  other  States,  by  many  political  excitements  and 
troubles.  President  Johnson's  order,  issued  May  9,  1865,  recognized  Francis  H. 
Pierpont,  who  was  originally  elected  Governor  in  West  Virginia,  and  who  had 
subsequently  moved  his  Government  seat  to  Alexandria,  and  exercised  jurisdic- 
tion over  a  few  counties  adjacent  to  Washington  during  the  war.  His  Legisla- 
ture consisted  of  members  from  ten  counties,  and  was  known  to  loyal  men  in  war 
time  as  the  "Legislature  of  Virginia.'.'  Governor  Pierpont  went  to  Richmond 
shortly  after  the  surrender  at  Appomattox  Court- House,  and  called  a  special  ses- 
sion of  the  Legislature. 

In  October,  1865,  the  restriction  in  the  Constitution  prescribing  the  oath  rela- 
tive to  freedom  from  sympathy  with  the  late  Confederacy  was  removed.  The 
Legislature  met  at  Richmond  on  the  4th  day  of  December,  1865. 

During  this  year  the  Conservatives  attempted  to  inaugurate  a  practical  serf- 
dom of  the  freedmen,  by  means  of  vagrant  laws  ;  and  other  evidences  of  a  deter- 
mination to  revert  to  the  old  system  were  given.  But  the  State  Government, 
which  had  been  established  by  merely  a  handful  of  votes  in  the  northern  coun- 
ties, was  nevertheless  honestly  and  creditably  sustained,  and  Governor  Pierpont 
suddenly  found  himself  in  full  jurisdiction  over  Virginia. 

In  May  of  1866,  a  "Republican  State  Convention"  met  at  Alexandria,  and 
a  Special  Committee  reported  a  resolution  declaring  the  so-called  Legislature 
illegal  and  unconstitutional,  and  sent  a  memorial  to  Congress  demanding  the  re- 
vocation of  Governor  Pierpont's  powers,  and  asking  for  a  "  policy  of  reconstruc- 
tion." How  far  this  policy  had  been  rendered  necessary  by  the  action  of  the 
Conservatives  with  regard  to  the  negroes,  it  is  not  necessary  here  to  inquire.  As 
soon  as  the  Reconstruction  Act  of  Congress  had  become  a  law,  General  Schofield 
was  placed  in  command  of  the  First  Military  District,  which  comprised  the  terri- 
tory of  Virginia.  The  Conservatives,  who  had  intended  to  hold  a  convention 
at  Richmond  in  May  of  that  year,  and  to  so  amend  the  Constitution  as  to 
make  it  coincide  with  the  reconstruction  policy  of  Congress,  were  too  late  to 
escape  military  rule.  Governor  Pierpont  issued  orders  commanding  all  State 
officers  to  continue  the  exercise  of  their  duties  until  a  new  election  could  be  held 
under  reconstruction.  A  Board  of  Army  Officers  selected  the  officials  to  super- 
intend a  new  registration,  which  was  at  once  begun.  On  the  2d  of  April,  1867, 
an  order  appeared,  superseding  all  elections  under  the  "Provisional  Government," 
until  the  registration  should  be  completed.  The  Commanding- General  at  that 
time  made  all  appointments.  The  Conservatives  were  opposed  to  this  action, 
and  the  local  press  was  violently  critical. 

On  the  17th  of  April,  1867,  at  the  call  of  the  "Union  party  of  Virginia," 
a  convention  assembled  in  the  African  Church  in  Richmond,  of  which,  out  of 
two  hundred  and  ten  delegates,  only  fifty  were  white.     Other  political  meet- 


642  THE     CONSTITUTIONAL     CONVENTION. 

ings  were  elsewhere  held  about  the  same  time  by  freedmen  and  the  whites- 
allied  with  them.  Many  negroes  sided  with  the  Conservatives.  General 
Schofield  found  it  necessary  to  disband  all  armed  organizations  in  the  State. 
On  the  3d  of  June  orders  for  reconstruction  were  issued,  and  116,982  white, 
and  104,772  colored  voters  were  registered.  •  In  Amelia,  Brunswick,  Charlotte, 
Dinwiddie,  Elizabeth,  Halifax,  Powhatan,  and  York  counties  the  negroes  were 
overpoweringly  in  the  majority. 

Meantime,  the  Conservative  wing  of  the  Union  party,  so  called,  decided  to 
hold  a  convention  at  Charlottesville  on  the  4th  of  July,  1867,  but  it  was  finally 
determined  to  call  a  "  convention  of  all  the  unconditional  Union  men  of  Vir- 
ginia," to  meet  in  the  African  Church  in  Richmond  on  the  1st  of  August,  to 
secure  the  coalition  of.  the  two  wings  of  the  Republican  party  of  the  State. 
This  convention  was  packed  with  ignorant  negroes,  and  but  little  good  was. 
effected. 

A  number  of  ex-officers  and  soldiers  of  the  Union  held  a  convention  at 
Richmond  on  the  25  th  of  September.  Vacancies  in  offices  were  filled  by  tem- 
porary appointees.  Military  commissions  continued  to  try  offenders,  because 
the  strong  caste  prejudice  prevalent  in  the  State  endangered  the  lives  and  prop- 
erty of  persons  who  sat  upon  mixed  juries. 

On  the  22d  of  October  a  Constitutional  Convention  was  decided  upon  by  a 
popular  vote  and  a  majority  of  45,455.  Of  the  105  delegates  chosen  to  this 
Convention  the  mass  were  white  people.  The  Convention,  which  met  on  the  3d 
day  of  December,  proposed  to  provide  in  the  organic  law  of  the  State  that  negroes 
should  be  allowed  equal  privileges  with  whites  in  horse-cars,  public  places,  &c. 
Meantime  the  Convention  of  the  Conservatives  of  the  State  assembled  at  Rich- 
mond on  the  1 2th  of  December.  It  disclaimed  all  hostility  to  the  blacks,  but 
hotly  condemned  reconstruction  in  toto.  The  Republican  Constitutional  Con- 
vention finally  adopted  an  article  making  every  male  citizen  21  years  old,  who 
had  been  or  might  be  a  resident  of  the  State  for  twelve  months,  and  of  a 
county,  city,  or  town  three  months,  a  voter,  excepting  only  those  who  had 
been  engaged  in  insurrection.  The  test  oath  was  brought  in,  and  the  Conserva- 
tives at  once  rebelled  against  this,  as  did  also  the  commander  of  the  military 
district,  General  Schofield.  The  operation  of  the  test  oath,  inasmuch  as  all 
the  native  white  Virginians  had  been  engaged  in  the  work  of  secession,  would 
not  have  left  voters  enough  to  carry  on  the  Government  intelligently ;  but  the 
odious  provision  was  not  modified,  and  the  new  Constitution,  with  the  test  oath 
in  it,  was  adopted  by  the  Convention  April  17,  1868.  It  had  then  to  go  before 
the  people  for  ratification.     Virginia  remained,  however,  under  military  law. 

On  the  4th  of  April  of  the  same  year,  Governor  Pierpont's  term  of  office  ex- 
pired. Henry  H.  Wells  was  appointed,  by  military  authority,  Governor  of  the 
State.  Hon.  Joseph  Mayo,  who  had  been  Mayor  of  Richmond  for  fifteen  years, 
was  removed,  and  George  Chahoon  was  appointed  his  successor.  General 
Schofield  was  shortly  afterward  made  Secretary  of  War,  and  Major- General 
Stoneman  took  his  place  as  Military  Governor  of  Virginia.  Things  went  on 
quietly  thereafter  until   1869.     The  Constitution  which  the  Republican  Conven- 


CONVENTION      AT      PETERSBURG  —  VIRGINIA'S      READMISSION.  643 

tion  had  adopted  had  not  yet  been  presented  for  ratification.  It  was  evident 
that  under  its  provisions  the  more  intelligent  and  capable  citizens  of  the  com- 
monwealth were  to  be  excluded  from  office.  President  Grant,  being  authorized 
to  submit  the  Constitution  to  the  voters  of  the  State  and  to  allow  them  to  vote 
separately  on  the  separate  provisions,  appointed  the  6th  of  July  as  the  time  for 
ratification.  Wells  was  meantime  removed  from  the  Governorship.  General 
Stoneman  was  superseded  by  Major- General  Canby,  and  the  political  parties 
continued  an  active  canvass  of  the  State. 

Shortly  afterward  the  Republican  delegates  assembled  in  convention  at 
Petersburg  and  renominated  Mr.  Wells  for  Governor.  It  was  my  rare  fortune  to 
assist  at  the  session  of  this  Convention,  which  was  held  in  a  negro  church.  Never 
in  the  history  of  Republicanism  was  there  a  more  disgraceful  and  lawless  rabble 
assembled  together.  Gratifying  as  it  was  to  see  those  who  had  lately  been 
slaves  learning  something  of  Government  affairs,  it  was  utterly  discouraging  to 
note  the  violent  and  offensive  measures  which  they  took  to  obtain  their  ends. 
Brawls,  shoutings,  and  bickerings  consumed  an  entire  day,  and  the  police  were 
called  upon  four  times  to  clear  the  building  before  a  temporary  president  was 
chosen. 

Another  wing  of  the  Republican  party  of  the  State,  which  had  always  acted 
with  the  National  party,  but  which  took  no  part  in  the  Petersburg  Convention, 
nominated  Gilbert  C.  Walker  of  Norfolk,  an  accomplished  and  amiable  gentleman 
of  Northern  parentage,  as  its  candidate  for  Governor.  On  the  28th  of  April, 
1869,  the  Conservatives,  highly  pleased  with  this  nomination,  met  at  Richmond, 
and  favored  the  election  of  Mr.  Walker,  but  decided  to  use  all  their  efforts  to  vote 
down  the  odious  Constitution  which  the  Republicans  had  prepared.  The  Con- 
stitution was  accepted,  however,  on  the  6th  of  July,  at  a  general  election,  by  a 
majority  of  197,044  votes,  but  the  "  disfranchising  clause,"  which  had  been  the 
cause  of  much  of  the  ill  feeling  toward  the  reconstruction  policy  in  the  South, 
was  voted  down  squarely  by  a  majority  of  39,957  votes,  and  the  test  oath 
clause  was  also  lost  by  a  majority  of  40,992  votes.  Mr.  Walker  was  elected 
Governor,  with  the  cooperation  of  the  Conservatives,  by  a  majority  of  18,317 
votes.  In  the  Legislature  which  then  assembled  there  were  95  Conservatives 
and  42  Republicans,  with  18  negroes  in  the  House  and  6  in  the  Senate.  The 
Conservatives  at  once  assumed  an  attitude  of  conciliation,  and,  forgetting  the  old 
issues  and  prejudices  of  the  past,  ratified  the  14th  and  15th  amendments  to  the 
Constitution  of  the  United  States.  The  Republicans  were  discontented,  attribut- 
ing their  failure  to  the  separate  votes  on  the  clauses  of  the  State  Constitution.  * 

Virginia  was  readmitted  to  the  Union  on  the  26th  of  January,  1870.  On 
the  following  day,  General  Canby  retired  from  his  authority;  Governor  Walker 
assumed  his  office,  and  for  four  years  thereafter  governed  the  State  well  and 
fairly.  Had  all  the  other  Southern  States  been  as  fortunate  as  Virginia  in  escap- 
ing the  major  evils  of  reconstruction,  the  South  would  have  been  far  more  pros- 
perous than  she  can  now  hope  to  be  for  many  years. 

It  is  noteworthy  with  regard  to  Virginia  politics,  that  whenever  the  Conserv- 
ative politicians  make  a  campaign  up  and  down  the  State,  sometimes  flying  the 


644         GOVERNOR     KEMPER — HIS     VETO     OF     THE     PETERSBURG     BILL. 

old  Confederate  colors  a  little,  they  do  not  awaken  any  intense  enthusiasm  among 
the  working  population.  The  farmers  of  Virginia  are  too  much  occupied  with 
their  own  immediate  concerns  to  give  great  attention  to  State  politics.  They  feel 
determined  to  keep  the  negro  from  attaining  such  power  as  he  has  gained  in 
South  Carolina  and  Louisiana ;  but  they  are  apathetic,  and  any  attempt  to  organize 
them  into  a  party  of  extremists  would  be  an  inevitable  failure. 

The  present  government  of  the  State  is  in  good  hands.  The  officers  of  the 
State  Government  are  allied  to  the  Conservative  party,  but  seem  determined  to 
do  equal  and  exact  justice  to  all  classes  of  citizens.  Governor  Kemper,  elected 
over  Mr.  Hughes,  the  Republican  candidate,  in  1873,  was  a  Confederate  General, 
and  is  an  old-school  Virginian,  but  has  a  sufficient  appreciation  of  the  necessi- 
ties of  the  time  to  avoid  the  narrow  and  mean-spirited  policy  which  has  latterly 
characterized  some  of  the  other  Southern  States.  He  has  thus  far  done  every- 
thing that  he  could  to  develop  good-will  and  confidence  between  the  races. 
When  the  Legislature  of  the  State  proposed,  shortly  after  General  Kemper's 
election,  to  invade  the  liberties  of  the  city  of  Petersburg  and  to  take  from  it  its 
self-government  because  the  majority  of  the  voters  there  were  negroes,  the  Gov- 
ernor stood  up  boldly  against  this  movement  and  vetoed  the  bill.  In  his  veto 
message,  he  said : 

u  In  view  of  the  fundamental  conditions  on  which  Virginia  stands  as  a  mem- 
ber of  the  Federal  Union ;  in  view  of  our  own  solemn  and  sworn  recognition  of 
the  political  equality  before  the  law  of  all  men,  irrespective  of  race,  color,  or 
previous  condition,  the  proposed  measure,  if  enacted,  could  not  fail  to  subject  us 
to  disastrous  misconstruction  at  home  and  abroad.  It  would  renew  and  intensify 
the  race  agitations  of  the  past,  which  are  being  happily  settled ;  it  would  present 
Virginia  to  the  world  as  being  torn  by  intestine  feuds  of  an  apparently  intermi- 
nable character ;  it  would  discourage  and  postpone,  if  not  repel,  the  approach  of 
the  immigration  and  capital  to  which  our  most  ardent  hopes  are  directed ;  and, 
more  to  be  deplored  than  all,  it  would  sound  a  provocation  to  Federal  inter- 
ference in  our  domestic  affairs." 

In  these  words  of  Governor  Kemper  one  may  find  expressed  the  attitude  of 
the  better  class  of  Virginian  Conservatives.  The  determination  to  avoid  every- 
thing which  might  be  construed  as  ungenerous  toward  the  negro  ;  to  build  up 
his  character  by  education,  and  to  urge  him  to  accumulate  property;  the  gradual 
change  and  softening  of  public  sentiment  among  the  elder  aristocrats  with  regard 
to  the  introduction  of  manufactures  and  the  dignity  of  labor, — all  point  to  a 
change  in  the  character  of  the  Old  Dominion,  which  will  result  in  making  her  one 
day  as  rich  and  mighty  as  Pennsylvania  or  Missouri. 

The  aggregate  of  assessed  values  of  taxable  property  of  all  kinds  in  Virginia, 
in  1873,  was  not  quite  $337,000,000.  In  i860  the  assessed  value  of  the  real 
and  personal  property  actually  subjected  to  taxation  in  the  State  was  $585,099,- 
382,  and  the  official  reports  show  that  property  of  the  value  of  $163,556,100  was 
then  exempted  from  taxation,  thus  making  the  actual  aggregate  resources  of  the 
State  in  that  year  about  $748,000,000.  The  aggregate  value  of  real  and  personal 
property  within  the  38,348  square  miles  in  the  present  limits  of  Virginia  proper, 


POPULATION      OF      THE      STATE FUNDING     ACT.  645 

in  i860,  was  $632,000,000.  It  will  be  seen  from  these  figures  that  the  decline  in 
taxable  values  has  been  very  great  and  rapid.  The  losses  in  production  have  in 
some  cases  been  startling,  as  instanced  in  that  of  tobacco,  the  crop  of  which  in 
i860  amounted  to  123,968,312  pounds,  but  in  1870  to  only  37,086,364.  The 
decrease  in  production  is  largely  due  to  the  fact  that  the  slave  population,  which 
constituted  the  most  valuable  producing  class  before  the  war,  numbering  more 
than  half  a  milli6n  persons,  now  produces  little  but  a  bare  living  for  itself.  Until 
the  Virginian  negroes  learn  to  be  enterprising  and  industrious,  and  to  produce 
surplus  crops,  the  cultivation  of  the  great  staples  in  the  State  will  languish. 

Of  the  1,125,163  inhabitants  of  Virginia,  more  than  512,000  are  blacks.  It 
would  seem  that  both  whites  and  colored  people  spend  even  the  small  amount  of 
ready  money  which  they  have  upon  things  which  do  not  profit  their  souls ;  for 
General  Ruffner,  the  able  State  Superintendent  of  Public  Instruction,  asserts  that 
the  consumption  of  liquors  in  Virginia  amounts  to  something  like  $19,000,000 
annually.  During  the  fiscal  year  1872,  the  revenue  officers  of  the  United  States 
collected  from  liquor  dealers  in  Virginia  $71,000  in  licenses.  General  Ruffner  is 
probably  very  nearly  right  when  he  puts  the  cost  of  the  liquor  yearly  drank  as 
a  beverage  in  the  State  at  $12,000,000,  and  he  shows  the  folly  and  criminality  of 
the  general  indulgence  in  whiskey,  by  stating  that  the  gross  annual  product  of 
seven  of  the  best  counties  in  the  State  is  not  sufficient  to  pay  for  the  liquor  con- 
sumed by  the  people  of  the  commonwealth  ;  that  the  gross  production  of  nearly 
half  the  small  counties  would  not  compensate  for  annual  loss  by  drink ;  that  the 
Virginians  drink  up  the  value  of  their  wheat  crop  every  year ;  and  that  the  legis- 
lative cost  and  the  expenses  of  courts  and  civil  officers  and  State  institutions  and 
the  public  free  schools,  and  the  interest  on  the  enormous  public  debt,  only  amount 
to  a  little  more  than  one-quarter  of  the  sum  which  the  people  of  Virginia  yearly 
spend  upon  liquor.  Colonel  Burwell,  of  Richmond,  estimates  the  annual  con- 
sumption of  liquor  in  Virginia  at  2,500,000  gallons,  and  he  latterly  introduced 
a  bill  into  the  Legislature,  imposing  a  tax  of  30  cents  per  gallon  upon  this  liquor, 
which  would,  if  collected,  yield  the  State  a  revenue  of  $750,000.  But  this  bill 
has  not  yet  become  a  law. 

The  State  is  now  seriously  considering  the  sources  from  which  it  may  derive 
increased  revenue,  but  doubts  the  expediency  of  increasing  the  taxation  upon 
lands,  as  it  would  result  in  a  virtual  confiscation  of  private  property.  The  State 
credit  is  severely  prostrated ;  for,  while  the  debt  is  enormous,  considering  the 
present  condition  of  the  commonwealth,  the  interest  is  largely  in  arrears.  The 
act  known  as  the  Funding  act  pledged  the  State  to  the  regular  and  punctual 
payment  of  interest  on  the  debt,  which  it  provided  to  be  newly  funded  in  the 
name  of  Virginia;  but  the  State  was  unable  to  fulfill  these  obligations,  and 
both  debtors  and  creditors  were  but  poorly  satisfied  with  the  results.  The 
sum  then  funded,  the  interest  upon  which  is  largely  overdue,  was  $30,478,741.48, 
excluding  the  amount  assigned  for  settlement  with  West  Virginia.  The  reve- 
nues of  the  State,  as  compared  with  her  available  resources,  are  quite  large ;  yet 
they  are  usually  less  than  enough  to  support  the  Government  and  to  pay  full 
interest  on  the  debt.     The  Conservatives  will  take  care  to  do  nothing  tending 


646 


SENTIMENT      IN      FAVOR      OF      FREE      EDUCATION, 


to  impair  the  public  credit.  No  partial  or  total  repudiation  will  ever  be  consid- 
ered, and  the  impolicy  of  taxing  capital  heavily  is  thoroughly  understood. 
Virginia  will  not  fail  to  treat  liberally  all  capital  invested  in  the  establishment  of 
new  manufactures  within  her  boundaries. 

The  favorable  advance  in  public  sentiment  regarding  general  free  education 
in  Virginia  grows  more  noticeable  yearly.  It  is  largely  due  to  the  energetic 
campaign  upon  which  General  Ruffner,  the  State  Superintendent  of  Education, 
entered  under  the  Administration  of  Governor  Walker.  By  able  reports,  lec- 
tures, figures,  and  liberal  as  well  as  daring  policy,  he  has  revolutionized  opinion 
in  many  parts  of  the  State.  The  organization  of  the  graded  schools  is  rapidly 
becoming  general  in  thickly-populated  localities,  and  160,859  pupils  were  in 
1873  enrolled  upon  the  books  of  the  public  schools.  The  total  cost  to  the 
public  fund  for  education  was  $707,835,  and  the  total  cost  to  all  sources  nearly 
$800,000,  of  which  the  Peabody  fund  contributed  $31,450.  There  were  2,070 
students  in  the  various  universities  and  colleges  of  the  State,  1,207  °f  whom 
were  native  Virginians. 


■ 


A  Water-melon  Wagon. 


LXXIT. 


FROM     RICHMOND     TO      CHARLOTTESVILLE. 

RICHMOND  is  well  supplied  with  railroads.  The  Richmond,  Fredericksburg 
and  Virginia  road  extends  northward  to  Alexandria,  the  Potomac,  and 
Washington ;  the  Richmond  and  Petersburg  road  southward  to  Petersburg ; 
south-eastward  runs  the  rail  route  connecting  the  capital  with  Yorktown ;  south- 
westward  the  road  to  Danville,  and  thence  to  Greensboro'  in  North  Carolina, 
and  westward  the  Chesapeake  and  Ohio.  By  the  York  River  railway  route  one 
may  reach  the  battle-fields  of  Seven  Pines  and  Fair  Oaks,  only  four  miles  away. 


A  Marl -Bed  on  the  Line  of  the  Chesapeake  and  Ohio  Railroad. 

The  Chesapeake  and  Ohio  railroad  at  present  extends  from  Richmond 
through  the  Piedmont  country,  the  Blue  Ridge,  and  the  Alleghanies,  to  Hun- 
tington on  the  Ohio  river.  It  was  formed  by  a  consolidation  of  the  roads, 
properties  and  franchises  of  the  Virginia  Central  and  the  Covington  and  Ohio 
railroad  companies.  Its  charter  privileges  cover  the  line  from  tide-water  on  the 
James  to  the  Ohio  river,  at  or  near  the  mouth  of  the  Big  Sandy,  where  the 
borders  of  the  States  of  West  Virginia,  Kentucky  and  Ohio  touch  each  other. 
This  is  a  distance  of  427  miles.  Several  important  branches  and  extensions  are 
contemplated.  One  is  a  line  from  Richmond  down  the  peninsula,  between  the 
York  and  James  rivers,  to  a  point  on  the  deep  waters  of  the  Chesapeake 
bay,  near  the  Capes.  They  further  propose  to  give  Richmond  its  long  de- 
sired direct  communication  with  the  West  by  the  completion  of  the  Elizabeth- 
town,  Lexington  and  Big  Sandy  railroad  in  Kentucky  to  Huntington.  At 
Lexington  this  will  connect  with  Louisville,   Cincinnati  and  Lexington,  one  of 


648 


THE      CHICKAHOMINY HANOVER      COURT-HOUSE, 


the  oldest  roads  in  Kentucky,  and  there  will  then  be  a  direct  all- rail  line  640 
miles  in  length  between  Richmond  and  Louisville.  The  road  from  Richmond 
to  the  Ohio  river  was  opened  for  traffic  on  the  1st  of  April,  1873.  This  great 
central  highway  crosses  both  the  Blue  Ridge  and  the  Alleghany  mountains  by 
easy  grades,  the  highest  elevation  attained  being  about  two  thousand  feet.  It 
offers  special  advantages  for  the  transportation  of  the  surplus  productions  of  the 


Earthworks  on  the  Chickahominy,  near  Richmond,  Virginia. 

West  directly  to  the  largest,  deepest,  and  most  secure  harbor  on  the  eastern 
Atlantic  coast  of  the  United  States.  Along  the  greater  portion  of  the  route 
the  best  coals  abound,  in  thick  seams,  close  to  and  above  the  level  of  its  track ; 
and  this  coal  can  be  supplied  to  its  locomotives  at  the  bare  cost  of  handling. 
As  it  lies  near  the  38th  parallel  of  latitude,  it  is  never  liable  to  obstruction  from 
deep  snows,  nor  interruption  from  severe  frosts. 

The  journey  from  Richmond  to  the  Piedmont  country  along  this  line  of  rail 
takes  the  traveler  through  little  that  is  noteworthy.  The  Chickahominy  river, 
which  the  railroad  crosses  five  miles  from  the  capital,  is,  at  the  point  where  the 
right  wing  of  McClellan's  army  rested  in  June  and  July  of  1862,  an  unimpressive 
stream.  Various  dilapidated  and  grass-grown  earthworks  are  still  to  be  seen,  and 
are  amicably  pointed  out  and  discussed  by  ex- Confederate  and  ex-Federal  as 
the  train  passes.  A  few  miles  beyond  are  extensive  marl-beds,  whence  Vir- 
ginia draws  much  of  her  fertilizing  material;  although  her  planters  also  rely 
largely  on  the  guano  brought  from  the  Chincha  Islands  for  the  renewal  of  their 
fields. 

A  little  farther  on  is  Hanover  Court- House,  where  Henry  Clay  was  born, 
and  where  Patrick  Henry  first  gave  evidence  of  his  wonderful  oratorical  powers, 
by  his  famous  plea  against  "  the  parsons,"  who  had  brought  an  action  for  the 
recovery  of  certain  amounts  due  them  by  the  people. 

Here  and  there  along  the  route  are  corn-sheds,  unpretending  buildings  in 
which  the  farmers  store  their  grain  until  the  railway  officials  are  ready  to  trans- 
port it  to  Richmond. 

Bending  northward  and  westward,  through  the  rich  Hanover  and  Louisa 
counties,  and  crossing  at  right  angles  the  belt  of  iron  and  gold  deposits  extend- 
ing through  the  State,  Gordonsville,  seventy-six  miles  from  Richmond,  is  reached. 
This  is  an  important  junction.  The  line  of  road  from  Lynchburg  to  Washing- 
ton there  unites  with  the  Chesapeake  and  Ohio,  and  the  trains  of  the  two  roads 


HENRICO,      HANOVER,      AND       LOUISA      COUNTIES. 


649 


run  thence  to  Charlottesville  on  the  same  track.  Gordonsville  straggles  along 
a  rocky  road  running  through  a  beautiful  country,  upon  which  a  range  of  mount- 
ains looks  down.  There  are  many  fine  farms  in  the  vicinity,  and  the  English 
immigrants  have  done  much  to  give  the  section  the  air  of  peace  and  homely 
thrift  so  marked  in  some  British  agricultural  regions.  The  negroes,  who  swarm 
day  and  night  like  bees  about  the  trains,  look  with  amazement  upon  the  brisk  rosy 
young  men  and  women  who  throng  the  cars,  and  who  daily  appear  in  increased 
numbers  on  all  the  fine  farming  tracts  in  the  neighborhood. 

The  three  counties  of  Henrico,  Hanover  and  Louisa,  through  which  the 
Chesapeake  and  Ohio  railroad  passes  between  Richmond  and  Gordonsville,  con- 
stitute a  fine  specimen  section  of  the  tract  in  Virginia  known  as  the  "  Middle 
Country,"  which  has  an  area  of  twelve  thousand  square  miles,  and  is  sixty  miles 


Scene  at  a  Virginia  "Corn -Shed.' 

wide.  At  Gordonsville,  at  the  South-west  mountain,  the  surface  of  the  countr 
about  five  hundred  feet  above  sea-level.  The  light  brown  soil  of  the  ridges  and 
the  rich  dark  brown  of  the  bottom  lands  are  each  very  productive ;  and  even 
the  sides  and  summits  of  the  mountain  are  arable.  Tobacco,  wheat,  corn,  flax, 
oats  and  sweet  potatoes  grow  in  this  section  abundantly  and  well.  In  the  three 
counties  nearly  a  million  and  a-half  pounds  of  tobacco  were  produced  in  1870; 
and  in  i860,  the  average  production  of  tobacco  there  was  246  pounds  to  each 
inhabitant.  The  mud-beds,  sometimes  fifteen  feet  deep,  furnish  inexhaustible 
supplies  of  fertilizers ;  the  counties  contain  good  grazing-lands,  and  large  herds 
of  cattle  and  flocks  of  sheep  roam  in  the  valleys. 

At  Gordonsville  one  is  at  the  door  of  the  Piedmont  region,  which  extends 
from  the  head  of  tide- water  to  the  Blue  Ridge  mountains.  The  lower  part  of 
this  fertile  section  is  gently  undulating ;  the  upper  is  quite  hilly,  but  nowhere  so 


650 


THE      PIEDMONT      SECTION. 


broken  as  not  to  admit  of  cultivation.  The  tier  of  counties  included  in  this 
region  comprises  an  area  of  six  thousand  square  miles.  At  the  outbreak  of 
the  war,  nearly  half  the  land  in  these  counties  had  been  put  under  culture,  and 
the  population  of  two  hundred  thousand  persons  scattered  through  the  district 
raised  annually  about  twenty-five  million  pounds  of  tobacco.*  The  lands  are 
among  the  very  finest  in  America ;  the  red,  crumbling  loam  is  easily  worked, 
and  from  it  spring  noble  grass,  excellent  grain,  and  delicious  orchard  fruits. 

The  approaches  to  Charlottesville,  the  principal  town  of  Albemarle  county, 
afford  a  glimpse  of  the  beauties  of  the  Piedmont  section.     The  mountains  show 


Gordonsville,  Virginia — "The  negroes,  who  swarm  day  and  night  like  bees  about  the  trains."     [Page  649. J 


their  blue  outlines ;  the  slopes  are  dotted  with  rich  farms ;  the  landscape  is 
radiant^with  peace  and  plenty.  Before  the  war  this  county  was  a  region  of  large 
plantations,  principally  devoted  to  tobacco,  of  which  hundreds  of  slaves  raised 
five  millions  of  pounds  annually.  Now  the  production  amounts  to  but  little 
more  than  a  million  and  a-half  pounds  yearly ;  but  it  will  in  due  time  regain 
the  old  number ;  for  no  section  of  Virginia  is  more  rapidly  recovering  from  the 
disorganization  of  labor,  and  the  discouragements  which  followed  upon  the  war, 
than  Albemarle  and  her  fertile  sister  counties  at  the  foot  of  the  Blue  Ridge. 
*  The  whole  amount  of  tobacco  raised  in  Virginia  in  1870  was  37,086,364  pounds. 


CHARLOTTESVILLE MONTICELLO, 


65I 


English  immigrants  are  bringing  money  and  accurate  knowledge  of  scientific 
farming  into  the  country,  and  are  prompting  to  a  new  vigor  the  natives  who 
had  begun  to  yield  under  the  pressure  of  the  adverse  fortunes  of  the  past  few 
years. 

Charlottesville  is  one  of  the  loveliest  of  Virginia  towns.  It  has  an  air  of 
dignified  quiet  which  befits  so  ancient  and  distinguished  a  seat  of  learning  as 
the  University  of  Virginia,  and  the  neighbor  of  such  historic  ground  as  Monti- 
cello,  the  home  of  Thomas  Jefferson.  The  town  stands  on  a  moderate  elevation, 
shut  in  on  the  south-west  by  hills  beyond  which  rise  the  ridges  known  as 
the  "Ragged"  mountains.  To  the  north-west  one  sees  in  the  distance  the 
symmetrical  outlines  of  the  Blue  Ridge.  On  the  east  is  the  Rivanna,  a  pretty 
stream,  although  its  waters  are  discolored  by  the  reddish  loam  through  which  it 
flows  around  the  base  of  Monticello.  The  railroad  is  an  ungracious  intruder, 
as  locomotives  saucily  shriek  at  the  very  doors  of  sleepy  taverns,  and  trains  rattle 
through  streets  where  everything  seems  to  resent  the  outbursts  of  steam  and  the 
clang  of  wheels.  The  negro  is  omnipresent,  the  blacks  appearing  at  first  vastly 
to  outnumber  the  white  folks.  Many  pleasant  mansions  are  surrounded  with 
gardens  embowered  in  shrubbery. 

A  storm  was  muttering  overhead  as  I  climbed,  one  midsummer  day,  the  steep 
road  which  leads  from  Charlottesville  to  Monticello.  Here  and  there  a  turn  in 
the  route  gave  me  exquisite  glimpses  of  the  valley  below  ;  the  old  town  with  its 
many  dingy  brown  houses,  asleep  on  the  plateau ;  the  dome  of  the  University 
peeping  above  the  foliage,  and  the  delicate  blue  of  the  far-away  mountains. 
Just  as  I  was  beginning  to  suspect  that  I  had  lost  my  way,  I  came  to  an  ill-kept 
road  branching  away  from  the  main  one.  Ascending  this,  while  rain-drops  clat- 
tering on  my  face  warned  me  to  seek  shelter, 
I  came  suddenly  upon  the  tomb  of  the  author 
of  the  "Declaration  of  Independence." 

I  rattled  at  the  rusty  iron  gate  set  in  the 
shabby  brick  wall;  but,  observing  an  enormous 
padlock,  I  turned  away  and  continued  the 
ascent  toward  the  hill-top,  when  I  noticed 
an  ancient  negro  man  in  the  pathway,  vainly 
endeavoring  to  force  an  unruly  yoke  of  oxen 
to  obey  him.  The  snows  of  eighty  or  ninety 
winters  had  frosted  his  wool;  the  labors  of 
many  years  of  servitude  had  bent  him  double. 
He  did  not  at  first  hear  my  salutation,  but 
continued  his  husky  appeals  to  the  oxen. 
"Debbil  in  dem  critturs,  sho  ;"  then  spying 
me,  he  took  off  his  greasy  hat  with  an  explo- 
sive "Sah!"  A  sprightly  negro  urchin  ran 
out  to  aid  the  venerable  blackamoor,  but  seeing  me,  grinned  good-day,  and  led 
the  way  to  the  house.  On  the  right,  as  we  approached,  stood  a  row  of  negro 
cabins,  from  one  of  which  a  black  woman  came  out,  courtesying,  and  as  it  was  at 
42 


The  Tomb  of  'Ihomas  Jefferson,  at  Monticello, 
near  Charlottesville,  Virginia. 


652 


THE      HOME      OF     JEFFERSON. 


Monticello  —  The  Old  Home  of  Thomas  Jefferson,  author  of  the  Declaration 
of  American  Independence. 


last  raining  rapidly,  I  entered  her  door.     The  cabin  or  hovel  was  wretched  in 

the  extreme;    a    small    window    lighted    a    poor    room,    in    which    there    was 

scarcely  any  furniture.     On  an  uneven  hearth  a  weak  fire  struggled  with  the~ 

j_jf_^„_^^.  dampness.     On  the  lawn 

near  the  path  which  led, 
by  a  gentle  ascent,  to  the 
mansion,  was  the  body  of 
an  old  infantry  baggage- 
wagon,  marked  "  U.  S." 
Evidently  the  "late  un- 
pleasantness" had  pene- 
trated even  to  Monticello. 
The  house,  surrounded 
by  beautiful  aspen  .trees, 
and  with  its  chances  for  an 
outlook  over  an  ocean  of 
foliage  on  one  side,  and  a 
lovely  valley  hemmed  in 
by  lofty  mountain  ranges 
on  the  other,  must  have  been  a  pleasant  retreat  in  the  last  century.  I  could 
almost  fancy  that  the  long-vanished  master  of  the  estate  would  throw  open 
the  great  door  at  which  I  knocked,  under  the  lofty  portico,  and  usher  me 
into  the  dining-room,  where  I  should  find  the  Marquis  de  Lafayette  gayly 
chatting  with  some  country  squire,  or  mayhap  reading  the  memoranda  for  the 
tf  Notes  on  Virginia"  which  Mr.  Jefferson  prepared  mainly  for  the  instruction  of 
his  French  friends.  While  I  stood  at  the  door,  a  sharp  voice  inside  commanded 
various  colored  servants  to  look  "yere"  and  there  after  the  key,  and  I  was  pres- 
ently ushered  in,  not  by  the  ghost  of  the  great  patriot,  but  by  a  sour- looking  man, 
who  collected  a  small  fee  before  I  could  set  foot  upon  the  sacred  threshold.  He 
then  proceeded  to  inform  me  that  the  estate  was  in  litigation,  and  that  it  had 

«n  down"  very  much,  which  indeed  was  quite  easy  to  see.  The  interior  of  the 
jision,  although  stripped  of  nearly  everything  placed  there  by  Jefferson,  has 
a  few  reminders  left.  A  curious  old  clock  stands  in  a  corner  of  the  entrance 
hall,  and  a  marble  bust  of  Jefferson  himself  occupies  a  dusty  niche.  The  little 
dining-room  with  polished  inlaid  floor,  and  gilt  Parisian  mirrors,  where  the  great 
man  was  wont  to  hob-nob  over  dinner  with  Lafayette,  or  distinguished  chance 
visitors,  is  still  in  good  order;  the  dumb  waiter  yet  creaks  solemnly  in  its  grooves, 
and  frofti  the  old-fashioned  windows  one  can  look  out  upon  a  charming  lawn,  and 
on  leafy  hill-sides.  The  house  is  a  fair  specimen  of  the  commodious  and  not  in- 
elegant structures  erected  in  Virginia  in  colonial  times,  and  when  filled  with 
Jefferson's  superb  collections  of  sculpture,  paintings,  medallions,  engravings  and 
books,  must  have  been  an  oasis  of  peace  to  gentlemen  of  culture  who  traveled 
slowly  on  horseback  through  the  Virginia  woods  a  hundred  years  ago.  The 
library  building,  separated  from  the  house,  but  communicating  with  it  by  means 
of  a  covered  passage-way,  still  stands.    The  whole  is  fast  decaying,  however,  and 


THE      UNIVERSITY      OF     VIRGINIA. 


653 


if  the  State  will  not,  the  country  should,  see  that  the  home  of  Jefferson  is,  like  that 
of  Washington,  preserved  as  an  historic  shrine  to  which  the  lovers  of  liberty  may 
repair  for  many  generations  to  come. 

The  little  negro  boy,  carrying  an  immense  key,  bounded  before  me  to  the 
tomb,  whither  I  went  once  more,  despite  the  rain,  which  now  came  heavily. 
Entering,  I  found  that  the  enclosure  was  a  family  burying-ground.  Over  the 
grave  of  the  great  statesman  stands  a  simple,  almost  rude  granite  obelisk,  eight 
feet  high,  on  which  is  the  epitaph  which  he  himself  desired  to  have  inscribed  on 
his  tomb : 

"  Here  Lies  Buried 

Thomas    Jefferson, 

Author  of  the  Declaration  of  Independence  ■ 

Of  the  Statute  of  Virginia  for  Religious  Freedom 

And  Father  of  the  University  of  Virginia. " 

The  University  at  Charlottesville  is  Jefferson's  noblest  monument.  So  long  as 
it  endures,  the  admirers  of  the  great  Virginian  can  afford  to  forego  lamentation 
over  the  ingratitude  of  republics,  and  refrain  from  criticising  the  Government 
which  is  too  niggardly  to  place  a  marble  shaft  over  his  grave.  Jefferson  founded 
the  University  in  18 19,  and  watched  with  tender  care  its  early  growth  and  im- 


The  University  of  Virginia,  at  Charlottesville. 

mediate  success.  Always  an  ardent  admirer  of  the  school  system  prevalent  in 
New  England  in  his  time,  he  urged  Virginia  to  adopt  it,  even  while  she  was 
struggling  in  the  Revolution.  His  zeal  was  so  great  that,  after  persistent  labor 
for  many  years,  he  succeeded  in  influencing  the  State  Legislature  to  adopt  a  free- 
school  system ;  but  its  practical  operation  was  prevented  by  a  proviso  which  some 


654  THE     LITERARY     FUND. 

Conservative  legislators  managed  to  attach  to  the  bill,  giving  the  county  courts, 
whose  officials  were  unfriendly  to  Mr.  Jefferson's  plan,  the  privilege  of  declaring 
when  the  schools  should  be  established  in  each  county. 

He  was  not  discouraged,  although  he  saw  that  the  commonwealth  gave  more 
attention  to  internal  improvements  than  to  the  education  of  her  people ;  and  he 
never  forgot,  even  when  seemingly  absorbed  in  national  politics,  his  schemes  for 
making  universal  free  education  popular  in  Virginia.  When,  after  retiring  from 
the  Presidency  in  1809.  he  again  took  up  his  residence  in  the  State,  he  returned 
to  the  work  with  new  energy.  A  "  literary  fund "  was  founded  by  an  act  of 
the  State  Legislature  in  18 10;  the  proceeds  of  this  fund  were  designed  to  be 
used  exclusively  for  the  purposes  of  common  school  education.  The  principal 
had  at  one  time  grown  to  two  millions  of  dollars ;  but  since  the  war  it  has  yielded 
nothing.  Its  original  nucleus*  consisted  of  fines,  forfeitures,  and  escheats.  Mr. 
Jefferson  succeeded,  in  18 18,  in  obtaining  another  legislative  enactment,  which 
allowed  an  appropriation  of  $15,000  yearly  to  endow  and  support  a  university. 
A  report  recommending  the  establishment  of  this  university,  various  colleges, 
and  a  scheme  for  general  public  education,  had  been  made  to  the  Legislature  in 
1 8 16,  doubtless  at  the  instance  of  Mr.  Jefferson,  and  in  1821  the  institution 
whose  noble  rotunda  to-day  rises  in  graceful  relief  against  the  blue  mountains 
near  Charlottesville  began  to  receive  State  aid,  which  continued  without  interrup- 
tion until  toward  the  close  of  the  late  war. 

Jefferson  planned  the  University,  and  it  still  retains  the  characteristics  which 
he  gave  it.  In  the  departments  of  languages,  literature,  science,  law,  medicine, 
agriculture,  and  engineering,  it  has  to-day  eighteen  distinct  schools.  For  more 
than  half  a  century  it  has  been  preeminent  among  the  higher  institutions  of 
learning  in  the  country,  and  Northern  colleges  and  universities  have  borrowed 
from  it  the  feature  of  an  elective  system  of  study.  It  has  latterly  established 
excellent  agricultural  and  scientific  schools,  has  a  fine  laboratory,  with  an  ex- 
tensive collection  of  raw  and  manufactured  materials,  and  an  experimental  farm 
inferior  to  none  in  the  country.  Its  government  is  vested  in  a  rector,  and  two 
visitors  from  each  grand  division  of  the  State,  except  Piedmont,  which,  because 
it  is  the  location  of  the  University,  is  entitled  to  three.  The  institution  bestows 
no  honorary  degrees,  and  makes  the  attainment  of  its  "  Master  of  Arts"  so 
difficult  that  it  will  serve  as  a  certificate  of  scholarship  anywhere.  Nearly  one 
hundred  and  fifty  of  the  graduates  of  the  several  schools  are  now  professors  in 
other  colleges.  The  University  is  by  no  means  aristocratic  in  its  tendencies ;  a 
large  proportion  of  the  students  pay  their  expenses  with  money  earned  by 
themselves,  and,  since  the  war,  there  have  been  many  "State  students"  who 
are  provided  with  gratuitous  instruction.  The  alumni  form  an  army  fourteen 
thousand  strong. 

The    buildings    of  the  University  are  not  architecturally  fine,  although  the 

main  edifice  has  a  rotunda  modeled  in  part  after  the  Pantheon  at  Rome.     The 

country  around  the  elevation  a  mile  west  of  Charlottesville  on  which  they  stand, 

is  exquisitely  lovely.     The  great  porticoes,  whence  one  can  look  out  upon  lawns, 

*  Report  of  Dr.  Ruffner,  State  Superintendent  of  Education  in  Virginia. 


EMINENT     PROFESSORS, 


655 


on  the  trim  houses  where  the  professors  live,  and  on  the  dormitories  for  the 
students,  are  beautiful.  In  the  well- arranged  and  amply- stocked  library  hangs  a 
fine  portrait  of  General  Lee,  by  Elder.  Among  the  academic  groves,  Long,  and 
Key,  and  Silvester,  whose  names  are  eminent  both  in  England  and  America, 
and  Courtenay,  Rogers,  Emmett  and  Bonnycastle,  famous  instructors,  once  had 
their  homes. 


A  Water-  melon  Feast. 


LXXIII. 

FROM  CHARLOTTESVILLE  TO  STAUNTON,  VA. — THE  SHENAN- 
DOAH VALLEY — LEXINGTON  —  THE  GRAVES  OF  GENERAL 
LEE  AND  "STONEWALL"  JACKSON  —  FROM  GOSHEN  TO 
"WHITE     SULPHUR     SPRINGS." 


THE  route  from  Charlottesville  to  Staunton,  through  Albemarle  and  Augusta 
counties,  passes  some  of  the  finest  farming-land  in  the  Piedmont  section. 
In  summer, 'one  sees  fields  clad  in  the  green  of  the  tobacco  leaf,  or  in  the  luxu- 
riant clover,  timothy,  blue,  orchard,  and  herds'  grasses.  The  fruits  flourish  in 
perfection ;  the  pippin,  the  pear  and  the  grape  attain  unusual  size,  and  yet  have 


Piedmont,  from  the  Blue  Ridge. 

delicate  flavor.  Looking  out  from  the  train  as  it  begins  to  scale  the  base  of  the 
Blue  Ridge,  one  gazes  down  into  fertile  valleys,  with  little  streams  flowing 
through  them ;  upon  expanses  of  meadow ;  and  on  lusty  vineyards  clothing 
the  hills. 

The  Chesapeake  and  Ohio  railroad  traverses  the  Blue  Ridge  at  a  point  no 
less  rich  in  mountain  scenery  than  that  section  near  the  Peaks  of  Otter  through 
which  the  Atlantic,  Mississippi  and  Ohio  road  runs ;  but  it  slips  under  the  great 
ridges,  instead  of  winding  among  them.  The  Blue  Ridge  tunnel,  seven-eighths 
of  a  mile  long,  was  built  by  Virginia,  under  the  supervision  of  her  State  En- 
gineer, Colonel  Claude  Crozet,  an  old  soldier  of  Napoleon  the  Great.  This 
persevering  engineer  worked  seven  years  at  the  tunnel  before  he  saw  light 
through  it. 

Coming  out  from  the  "  great  bore,"  the  traveler  descries  the  Shenandoah  val- 
ley, the  pride  of  Virginia,  outspread  in  its  loveliness  before  him.  As  far  as  he  can 
see,  his  gaze  rests  upon  highly-cultivated  farms  and  noble  woodlands. 

"This  valley,"  to  quote  the  words  of  Major  Hotchkiss,  of  Staunton,  author 
of  the  "  Resources  of  Virginia,"  "forms  the  north-eastern  third  of  the  great  val- 


THE      SHENANDOAH      VALLEY. 


657 


ley  that  extends  for  nearly  three  hundred  and  sixty  miles  diagonally  across  the 
State."  This  latter  valley  in  turn  "forms  about  one-tenth  of  the  Appalachian 
valley,  that,  under  the  various  local  designations  of  Champlain,  Hudson,  Goshen, 
Kittatinny,  Lebanon,  Cumberland,  Shenandoah,  James,  Roanoke,  New  River, 
Holston,  East  Tennessee,  and  Warrior,  extends -from  the  St.  Lawrence  to  the 
Alabama  river,"  a  distance  of  fifteen  hundred  miles.     It  is  walled  on  the  east 


View  of  Staunton,  Virginia. 

throughout  its  whole  extent  by  the  Blue  Ridge,  on  the  west  by  the  ranges  locally 
known  as  the  Catskill,  Shawangunk,  Blue,  North  and  Cumberland,  and  is  a  lime- 
stone tract  "embracing  thirty  thousand  square  miles  of  the  best  farming  and 
grazing-land  on  the  continent,  margined  on  each  side  by  inexhaustible  deposits 
of  richest  hematite  iron  ores. 

The  "  Shanando',"  as  the  negroes  call  it,  includes  about  five  million  acres 
of  land,  of  which  nearly  two-thirds  are  either  under  cultivation  or  enclosed  in 
farms;  the  remainder  is  open  to  immigrants.  The  valley  is  especially  noted 
for  its  grain  and  grass-growing  capacity.  In  1866  its  wheat  product  was  three 
and  a-quarter  million  bushels ;  it  produced  three  million  pounds  of  tobacco,  and 
five  and  a-half  million  bushels  of  corn.  At  the  outbreak  of  the  war,  it  was  one 
of  the  finest  stocked  farming  countries  in  the  world.  In  Augusta  county,  at  the 
head  of  the  valley,  English  settlers  have  purchased  many  estates.  That  county 
is  well  underlaid  with  mineral  treasure.  Jefferson,  in  his  "  Notes  on  Virginia," 
mentions  that,  in  his  time,  iron  mines  were  worked  in  Augusta  county.  Great 
impetus  has  been  given  to  the  mineral  development  there  by  the  extension  of 
the  railroad  through  the  Kanawha  valley,  which  is  stocked  with  cheap  and 
abundant  fuel,  to  the  furnaces  along  the  Ohio  river  for  which  the  Virginia 
ores  are  always  eagerly  demanded.  Lands  which  contain  veins  of  hematite 
ore  are  easily  obtainable;  good  agricultural  tracts  may  be  purchased  from 
$25  to  $30  per  acre. 

Twelve  miles  from  the  base  of  the  mountain  through  which  the  tunnel  is 
pierced  lies  the  pretty  hill-town  of  Staunton,  where  two  of  the  principal  State 
charities,  the  Western  District  Asylum  for  the  Insane,  and  the  Institution  for  the 
Deaf,  Dumb  and  Blind,  are  located.     As  Staunton  is  also  a  very  central  point, 


658 


STAUNTON WEYER    S      CAVE. 


and  one  of  the  healthiest  places  in  Virginia,  it  is  the  seat  of  several  semi- 
naries for  young  ladies.  A  walk  along  its  steep  streets  induces  the  stranger 
to  believe  that  the  town  has  more  beautiful  girls  than  are  to  be  found  any- 
where else  in  the  South ;  but  the  presence  of  so  many  lovely  creatures  is 
explained  by  the  fact  that  six  hundred  lady  pupils  are  gathered  there  from 
the  Middle,  Southern  and  Western  States,  and  that  they  represent  the  best 
society  of  the  whole  country.  The  town  is  also  the  residence  of  Dr.  Sears,  the 
dispenser  of  the  educational  fund  donated  to  the  Southern  States  by  George 
Peabody.  Staunton  has  a  large  trade  in  tobacco  and  whiskey ;  many  wealthy 
people  have  fine  mansions  on  the  hills  which  rise  in  the  rear  of  the  business 
section ;  and  in  summer  the  hotels  are  crowded  with  tourists  on  their  way  to  the 
mineral  springs  of  Virginia,  and  to  the  natural  wonders  in  the  vicinity  of  the 
town.  One  of  the  most  remarkable  of  these  wonders  is  Weyer's  Cave,  a  "  vast 
subterranean  labyrinth  of  glittering  grottoes  and  galleries,"  where  stalactites 
sparkle  in  the  light  of  the  torches  carried  by  the  guides,  and  "  hang  from  the 
fretted  roof  like  the  foliated  pendants  of  a  Gothic  cathedral."     The  cave  was 


Winchester,  Virginia.     [Page  659.] 

discovered  in  1804,  by  Bernard  Weyer,  a  hunter  of  the  neighborhood.  The 
direct  course  through  it  is  sixteen  hundred  feet  long ;  the  main  path  usually 
taken  by  visitors  to  the  principal  apartments  and  galleries  is  six  hundred  and 
fifty  feet  long.  Washington's  Hall,  the  chief  curiosity  of  the  cave,  takes  its 
name  from  a  calcareous  formation  six  or  seven  feet  high,  which  bears  a  close 
resemblance  to  a  statue  in  classic  drapery.  "  Madison's  Cave,"  not  far  from 
Weyer's,  is  on  the  north  side  of  the  Blue  Ridge,  near  the  intersection  of  the  line 
of  Rockingham  and  Augusta  counties  with  the  south  fork  of  the  southern  Shen- 
andoah river.  In  Jefferson's  "Notes"  it  is  thus  described:  "It  is  in  a  hill  of 
about  200  feet  perpendicular  height,  the  ascent  of  which  on  one  side  is  so  steep 
that  you  may  pitch  a  biscuit  from  its  summit  into  the  river  which  washes  its. 
base.  The  entrance  of  the  cave  is  in  this  side,  about  two-thirds  of  the  way  up. 
It  extends  into  the  earth  300  feet,  branching  into  subordinate  caverns,  sometimes 
ascending  a  little,  but  more  generally  descending,  and  at  length  terminates  in 
two  different  places  at  basins  of  water  of  unknown  extent.  The  vault  of  this 
cave   is  of  solid  limestone,  from  20  to  40  or  50  feet  high,  through  which  water 


STAUNTON      TO      HARRISONBURG. 


659 


is  continually  percolating.  This,  trickling  down  the  sides  of  the  cave,  has  in- 
crusted  them  over  in  the  form  of  elegant  drapery,  and,  dripping  from  the  top  of 
the  vault,  generates  on  that,  and  on  the  base  below,  stalactites  of  a  conical  form, 
some  of  which  have  met  and  formed  massive  columns." 

Northwest  of  Staunton,  in  Augusta  county,  are  the  Cyclopean  Towers,  formed 
of  limestone.  They  rise  to  the  height  of  seventy  feet,  and  resemble  the  battle- 
ments of  a  feudal  castle. 

Staunton  is  certainly  one  of  the  pleasantest  summer  retreats  in  Virginia.  The 
road-bed  of  the  Chesapeake  and  Ohio  railroad  there  is  1,386  feet  above  tide- 
water. The  atmosphere  is  dry  and  cool.  Sheltered  on  the  east  by  the  barrier 
of  the  Blue  Ridge,  and  on  the  west  by  a  loftier  range,  from  which  Ellsworth's 
Knob  rises  to  the  height  of  4,448  feet  above  the  sea-level,  the  piercing  blasts 
which  sweep  down  from  the  Alleghanies  in  winter  are  broken.  The  Valley  of 
the  Shenandoah  is  often  free  from  snow  when  the  less  protected  regions  adjacent 
are  covered  with  the  white  veil  of  winter. 

The  Valley  railroad  now  runs  from .  Staunton  through  Harrisonburg,  Stras- 
burg,  and  Winchester,  to  Harper's  Ferry,  at  the  confluence  of  the  Potomac  and 
Shenandoah  rivers.  I  made  the  journey  from  Staunton  to  Harrisonburg,  twenty- 
five  miles,  in  a  stage,  before  the  railway  was  completed.  The  route  stretches 
through  a  rich,  farming  country,  studded  with  fine  square,  antique  mansions  sur- 
rounded with  tall  trees.  The  roads  are  excellent;  the  fields  are  divided  by  walls 
of  the  limestone  which  abounds  thereabout,  and  are  well  cultivated.  Harrison- 
burg is  an  old-fashioned  Virginian  town  which  has  awakened  into  activity  since 
the  railroad  reached  it ;  the 
citizens  are  anxious  to  join  in 
the  efforts  to  make  a  "  New 
Virginia"  out  of  the  "Old 
Dominion."  The  Shenandoah 
valley  felt  the  shock  of  war 
as  keenly  as  any  section  of 
the  South.  It  was  overrun 
by  the  contending  armies ; 
exhausted  by  the  repeated 
foraging  expeditions  of  Con- 
federates and  Federals ;  and 
at  the  close  of  the  contest 
its  inhabitants  were  pretty 
thoroughly  discouraged. 

Half-way  between  Staun- 
ton and  the  Potomac  river 
two  ranges  of  mountains  run 
parallel  for  twenty-five  miles, 
finally  uniting  in  Massanutten 
mountain,  which  separates  the  branches  of  the  Shenandoah  river,  and  ends 
abruptly  to  the  southward  in  Rockingham  county.     These  parallel  ranges  hold 


Buffalo  Gap  and  the  Iron  -  Furnace.     [Page  660] 


66o 


"LURAY" STRASBURG — WINCHESTER. 


between  them  "  Luray,"  a  charming  valley  which  was  the  theatre  of  many  of 
the  exploits  of  Stonewall  Jackson  early  in  the  war,  and  through  which  Sheridan 
campaigned  later,  leaving  devastation  in  his  train.  Through  the  gaps  the  Con- 
federates kept  up  communication  with  the  forces  on  the  lower  lands  of  Northern 

Virginia,  along  the   Rapidan  and  the 
Rappahannock. 

At  Strasburg,  one  of  the  prettiest 
towns  in  the  valley,  one  gets  a  fine 
view  of  the  Massanutten  range,  whose 
steep  wooded  sides  seem  inaccessible. 
The  Virginians  still  point  with  pride 
to  the  pass  through  which  Stonewall 
Jackson  withdrew  his  army  when 
closely  pressed  by  McDowell  and 
Fremont  in  1862.  The  wily  General 
saw  that  the  Federals  were  determined, 
if  possible,  to  capture  him,  so  he  led 
his  hosts  through  the  upper  valley, 
and  speedily  placed  the  Massanutten 
ridge  between  his  army  and  the 
enemy,  his  guides  finding  paths  along 
the  precipices  where  none  but  natives 
of  the  region  could  possibly  have 
discovered  them. 

Winchester  is  one  of  the  oldest 
towns  in  the  valley,  and  has,  since 
the  earliest  settlements  there,  been  an 
important  trade  centre.  It  is  the 
chief  town  of  a  region  rich  in  historic  souvenirs  and  beautiful  scenery.  Wash- 
ington made  it  his  head-quarters  when  commanding  the  army  of  operations 
against  the  French  and  Indians  in  1756.  Lord  Fairfax  and  General  Morgan 
were  both  buried  there.  Not  far  from  Winchester,  on  the  lower  Opequan, 
is  Traveler's  Rest,  whither  General  Horatio  Gates  retired  after  his  disgrace  at 
the  battle  of  Camde*n.  Leetown,  still  nearer  Winchester,  was  long  the  home 
of  another  fallen  General,  Charles  Lee,  who  conducted  himself  so  badly  at  the 
battle  of  Monmouth  that  he  received  a  stinging  reproof  from  the  lips  of 
Washington.  Lee  and  Gates  were  fond  of  each  other's  company,  but  rarely 
visited  any  of  their  neighbors.  The  former  lived  and  died  a  sceptic.  The 
skirmishes  and  battles  around  Winchester  in  which  Jackson,  Banks,  Ewell  and 
Sheridan,  played  important  roles,  are  still  talked  of. 

Returning  to  Staunton,  and  continuing  along  the  line  of  the  Chesapeake  and 
Ohio  railroad,  the  traveler  will  pass  through  a  remarkable  cleft  in  the  mountains 
known  as  Buffalo  Gap.  It  is  a  passage  between  tall  cliffs  which  seem  to  have  been 
rent  asunder  by  earthquake  or  lightning  stroke,  and  through  it  the  buffaloes  once 
passed  in  their  annual  migrations.     Here  some  Baltimore  capitalists  have  erected 


Elizabeth  Iron  -  Furnace,  Virginia.     [Page  661.] 


ROCKBRIDGE      ALUM      SPRINGS. 


66 1 


an  iron  furnace,  and  six  miles  distant,  at  the  ore  bank  of  Elizabeth  Furnace,  rich 
seams  of  brown  hematite  may  be  seen.  A  little  beyond  this  is  the  highest  point 
reached  by  the 
railroad  between 
the  Chesapeake 
and  Ohio  rivers, 
2,073  feet  above 
the  tide.  To  the 
west  are  the  nu- 
merous Pasture 
rivers,  variously 
known  as  the  Cow 
Pasture,  the  Bull 
Pasture,  the  Big 
Calf  Pasture,  and 
the  Little  Calf 
Pasture,  and  Jack- 
son's river,  which 
are  the  principal 
sources    of    the 

T;,mp(.  rnsllPn  ^e  Alum  Spring  —  Rockbridge  Alum  Springs,  Virginia. 

on  the  "Big  Calf  Pasture"  river,  is  the  point  of  departure  for  the  town  of  Lex- 
ington, for  the  Natural  Bridge,  for  the  Cold  Sulphur  and  Rockbridge  Alum 
Springs,  and  for  the  Rockbridge  Baths. 

Rockbridge  Alum  Springs,  one  of  the  most  celebrated  of  Virginian  watering- 
places,  is  in  the  northern  portion  of  Rockbridge  county,  seventeen  miles  from 
Lexington,  and  is  now  easily  reached  by  an  eight- mile  ride  in  a  stage-coach 
southward  from   Goshen.     The  ^springs  lie   in   a  shallow  basin  between   pretty 

mountain  ridges.     From 
i  "      j^.^^a^^'  beneath    slate-stone 

L  arches  issue  five  fount- 

ains, whose  waters  have 
proven  efficacious  in  a 
variety  of  chronic  ail- 
ments. A  pretty  hotel 
stands  at  the  base  of  a 
high  mountain;  the 
lawns  are  girdled  with 
neat  cottages,  secluded 
among  the  trees.  The 
waters  contain,  in  com- 
mon with  the  alum 
which  gives  the  Springs 
their  name,  protoxide  of  iron,  sodium,  potash,  lime,  magnesia  and  ammonia,  and  , 
sulphuric,  carbonic,  chloric,  and  silicic  acids.     The  invalid  who  is  tired  of  the 


The  Military  Institute  —  Lexington,  Virginia.     [Page  662.] 


662 


LEXINGTON THE      MILITARY     INSTITUTE. 


glare  and  bustle  of  the  crowded  Northern  spring  resorts  can  find  at  the  "  Rock- 
bridge Alum"  absolute  tranquillity  and  the  charms  of  a  virgin  forest  within  a 
mile  from  his  hotel.  The  Rockbridge  Baths,  near  the  North  river,  are  richly- 
impregnated  with  iron,  and  are  so  buoyant  with  carbonic  acid  gas  that  the 
bather  floats  without  effort  in  the  refreshing  waters. 

Lexington,  twenty  niiles  from  the  Rockbridge  Alum  Springs,  is  filled  with 
solemn  memorials  for  Virginians.  From  the  Military  Institute*  there,  the  "West 
Point"  of  the  Old  Dominion,  went  out  some  of  the  best  talent  engaged  in  the 
service  of  the  Confederacy ;  three  of  its  professors  and  one  hundred  and  twenty- 
five  of  its  alumni  were  killed,  and  three  hundred  and  fifty  of  the  graduates  of  the 
institution  were  maimed  in  the  war.  The  grave  of  "Stonewall"  Jackson,  who 
left  the  peaceful  retreat  of  his  college  home  to  fight  for  his  State  against  the 
Union,  is  in  the  Presbyterian  burying-ground.     Above  the  simple  mound  a  board 


'   Washington  and  Lee  College  —  Lexington,  Virginia. 

headstone,  painted  in  imitation  of  marble,  is  now  the  only  memorial  of  the 
brave  General's  resting-place;  but  latterly  an  effort  has  been  made  to  secure 
funds  for  the  erection  of  a  memorial  chapel,  at  the  Institute  where  he  was  for 
fourteen  years  a  professor,  to  perpetuate  his  memory.  The  Institute  was 
destroyed  in  1864  by  the  Federal  troops,  but  has  succeeded  in  securing  new 
buildings  and  re-establishing  itself  completely  without  demanding  the  aid  of  a 
dollar  from  the  State  treasury.  In  a  commonwealth  where  military  discipline 
and  training  are  considered  as  indispensable  parts  of  a  general  education,  the 
Institute  is  a  great  power,  and  will,  doubtless,  in  future,  be  fostered  and  encour- 
aged by  the  State.  Since  the  war  it  has  extended  the  benefits  of  its  course  to 
pupils  from  all  the  States  of  the  Union. 

*  The  Virginia  Military  Institute  was  organized  in  1839   as   a   State  military  and  scientific 
school,  on  the  basis  of  the  U.  S.  Military  Academy  at  West  Point. 


WASHINGTON  AND  LEE    COLLEGE. 


663 


"Washington,"  or,  as  it  is  now  called,  "Washington  and  Lee  College," 
also  located  at  Lexington,  is  one  of  the  oldest  literary  institutions  in  the  South. 
It  was  established  as  an  academy  in  1776,  by  the  Hanover  Presbytery,  which 
then  embraced  the  whole  of  the  Presbyterian  Church  in  Virginia,  and  was 
christened  Liberty  Hall.  In  1 796  it  obtained  its  first  regular  endowment  at  the 
hands  of  Washington.  The  Father  of  his  Country  had  received  from  the  Legis- 
lature, as  a  testimony  of  gratitude  for  his  services,  some  shares  in  what  was 
then  known  as  the  "James  River  Improvement."  He  was  unwilling  to  accept 
them  for  his  private  gain,  and  therefore  presented  them  to  "  Liberty  Hall." 
This  generous  act  induced   the    trustees   to   change  the  name  of  the  academy 


Portrait  of  General  Thomas  J.  Jackson,  known  as  "Stonewall  Jackson. 
[From  an  engraving  owned  by  M.  Knoedler  &  Co.,  N.Y.] 

to  "Washington,"  and  it  kept  it  when  it  became  a  college.  Rockbridge 
county  gave  birth  to  McCormick,  the  noted  inventor  of  the  reaping-machine. 
He  has  furnished  the  money  to  build  an  astronomical  observatory  at  Washing- 
ton and  Lee  College,  and  the  Peabody  Fund  has  also  given  the  institution  a 
generous  sum. 

After  the  fall  of  the  Confederacy,  General  Robert  E.  Lee  took  the  presidency 
of  the  college,  which  before  the  war  had  rarely  gathered,  more  than  a  hundred 
students  at  a  time  within  its  walls.  The  fame  of  the  soldier-president,  and  the 
affection  of  the  Southern  people  for  him,   brought  the  number  up  to  five,  and 


664 


GENERAL      ROBERT     E.     LEE. 


sometimes  seven  hundred.  General  Lee  held  the  presidency  of  the  college 
until  his  death,  on  the  nth  of  October,  1870.  The  name  of  the  institution  was 
then  changed  to  Washington  Lee,  and  George  Washington  Custis  Lee,  a  son  of 
the  deceased  General,  is  now  president  of  the  institution. 

The  University  Chapel,  in  the  basement  of  which  are  the  tombs  of  General 
Lee  and  his  wife,  is  a  plain  brick  building,  with  an  auditorium  capable  of  hold- 
ing from  eight  hundred  to  a  thousand  persons.  The  basement  is  built  of  gray 
Virginia  limestone  blocks,  large  and  rough.     The  building  was  planned  and  its 


General  Robert  Edward  Lee,  born  January  19,  1801 ;  died  October  11,  1870. 

erection  superintended  by  General  Lee  himself.  It  is  unfinished,  from  lack  of 
funds.  At  the  time  of  General  Lee's  death  the  basement  was  used  as  a  library, 
and  near  it  was  the  General's  private  office,  which  remains  exactly  as  he  left 
it  when  he  went  out  of  it  for  the  last  time.  After  his  death  the  trustees  and 
faculty  of  the  University  appropriated  the  basement  as  a  place  of  sepulture  for 


THE      GRAVE      OF      GENERAL      LEE, 


665 


the  Lee  family.     A  vault  or  pit  was  dug,  and  walled  and  cemented  in  the  middle 
of  the  large  room  formerly  used  as  a  library.      The  burial  case  containing  the 


The  Great  Natural  Arch — Clifton  Forge,  Jackson's  River.     [Page  668.] 

General's  remains  was  placed  in  this  vault,  and  over  it  were  laid  two  strata  of 
marble  slabs,  on  the  upper  of  which  is  the  following  simple  inscription : 

Gen.   Robert  Edward  Lee, 

Born 
Jan.    19,    1801 ; 

Died 
Oct.    11,    1870. 

The  wife  and  daughter  of  the  great  Confederate  chieftain,  who  speedily 
followed  him  to  rest,  repose  beside  him.  Around  the  graves  of  General  and 
Mrs.  Lee  there  is  a  railing  of  black  walnut,  and  some  dark  cloth  hangings  extend 

from  the  tops  of  the  corner -posts  to 
the  ceilings  above.  The  present  sur- 
roundings will  remain  only  until  the 
monument^  or  sarcophagus,  now  in 
preparation  by  the  sculptor  Valen- 
tine, of  Richmond,  is  finished.  When 
that  is  completed,  the  whole  basement 
will  be  modeled  into  a  "  Memorial 
Room,"  where  as  now,  one  of  the 
students  of  the  University  will  each 
day  stand  guard  as  a  "watcher  at 
the  tomb."  The  monument  will  cost 
fifteen  thousand  dollars. 

The  railroad  route  from  Goshen  to 
White  Sulphur  Springs,  the  famous 
watering-place  in  the  West  Virginia 
mountains,  is  lined"  on  either  hand 
with  exquisite  scenery.  It  extends 
Beaver  Dam  Fails.   [Page  668.]  through  Rockbridge,  Bath,  and  Alle- 


666 


THE      APPALACHIAN 


ghany  counties,  entering,  in  the  latter,  the  mountain  or  Appalachian  belt  of 
country,  which  has  a  width  of  from  twenty  to  fifty  miles,  and  is  very  equally 
divided  between  the  States  of  Virginia  and  West  Virginia.  In  the  twenty 
counties — ten  on  each  side  of  the  State  line — included  in  this  region,  there  was, 
in  1870,  a  population  of  only  148,509  persons,  or  twenty  to  the  square  mile. 
Hundreds  of  thousands  of  acres  of  dense  forest  still  clothe  the  mountain-sides ; 
hickory,  all  varieties  of  the  oak,  wild  cherry,  spruce,  pine,  black  walnut,  ash, 
chestnut,  all  abound;  finely-timbered  land  being  held  at  from  $10  to  $25  per 


Falling  Springs  talk,  Virginia,     [rage  667.] 

acre.  All  the  slopes  and  hill-sides  and  the  table-lands  are  covered  with  a  rich 
and  mellow  soil  that  gives  a  fine  yield,  when  properly  cultivated,  of  wheat,  corn, 
oats,  potatoes,  and  all  root  crops.  Mr.  Howell  Fisher,  a  Pennsylvania  iron-master, 
who  has  carefully  studied  this  Appalachian  belt,  says  that  cattle  and  sheep  "  fatten 
and  flourish  on  the  herbage  and  undergrowth  without  other  food,  and  with  liter- 
ally no  care."     The  opening  of  a  railroad  through  this  region  has  made  it  one 


THE     "WARM     SPRINGS    — MILLBORO 


66/ 


of  the  most  desirable  in  the  two  Virginias..  On  the  extensive  plateaus  between 
the  depressions  formed  by  the  washing  of  the  streams  there  are  fine  grazing  and 
orchard-lands,  and  millions  of  acres,  now  held  as  wild  lands,  are  available  for 
field  culture,  vineyards,  or 
sheep  pasturing,  and  can  be 
purchased  for  trifling  sums. 
A  little  beyond  Goshen 
the  rail  penetrates  the  rocky 
pass  of  Panther  Gap,  so 
called  because  the  early 
settlers  found  to  their  sorrow 
that  panthers  loved  to  dis- 
port therein.  From  North 
mountain  to  the  Allegha- 
nies  the  scenery  is  wildly 
beautiful.  Ravines,  hill-sides, 
with  ragged  forests,  log  cab- 
ins beside  rushing  streams, 
vistas  of  perfect  valleys,  the 
high  peak  of  Griffith's  Knob, 
blue  outlines  of  massive 
mountains,  charm  the  eye. 
The  "Cow  Pasture"  river 
flows  beside  the  tracks  for 
some  distance,  then  disap- 
pears among  the  hills.    From 

Millboro'  one  may  take  stage  for  the  "Warm  Springs," 
fifteen  miles  away,  in  a  lovely  valley  in  Bath  county.  At 
the  lower  end  of  this  valley  is  the  famous  "  Cataract  of 
the  Falling  Springs,"  where  a  stream  flowing  down  from 
the  "Warm  Spring"  mountain  falls  over  a  rock  two  hundred 
feet  high,  jeweling  with  its  many  cascades  the  bright  grasses 
and  ferns  below.  The  view  from  Warm  Spring  mountain  is 
accounted,  one  of  the  most  beautiful  in  Virginia,  and  not  far  from  it,  on  the 
banks  of  the  Cow  Pasture  river,  is  the  "Blowing  Cave,"  from  which  such  a 
current  of  air  constantly  comes  that  the  weeds  for  twenty  feet  in  front  of  the 
cavern  are  prostrated.  The  Hot  and  Healing  Springs  are  but  a  few  miles  from 
the  Warm  Springs  valley. 

At  Millboro'  for  many  years  the  trains  of  the  Virginia  Central  railway 
crossed  a  yawning  ravine  by  means  of  a  temporary  track,  running  down  one 
slope  and  up  the  other  at  a  grade  of  hundreds  of  feet  to  the  mile.  But  when 
the  Consolidated  railroad  line  was  completed,  this  ravine  was  filled  up,  and  the 
occupation  of  "  Mac,"  the  old  engine  driver,  whose  locomotive,  "  Mountain 
Climber,"  used  to  push  the  trains  up  the  hill,  was  gone.  The  artist  has 
rescued  him  from  oblivion. 
43 


Griffith's  Knob,  and  Cow  Pasture  River. 


668 


CLIFTON     FORGE — COVINGTON. 


At  Clifton  Forge,  where  Jackson's  river  rushes  through  a  gorge,  to  unite  with 

the  many  bright  streams  flowing  down  to  form  the  James,  a  mighty  arch  of  a 

half-mile  chord,  and  a  thousand  feet  to  the 

keystone,  is  visible  on  the  mountain-side.     In 

this  defile  the  clink  of  hammers  on  the  anvils 

o'f  numerous  forges  was  once  heard ;  but  only 

the  walls    of  the    buildings,    overgrown    with 

vines,  remain.     The  James  River  and  Kana- 
wha canal  is  one  day  to  have  a  channel  here, 

and   the  wild  loneliness  and  romance  of  the 

place  will  then  be  gone. 

Covington,  a  sprightly  town  on  Jackson's 

river,  is   a  favorite   point  of  departure  from 

the  railroad  for  the  Hot  and  Healing  Springs. 

On  the  road  leading  from   it  to   the    Sweet 

Springs,  the  clear  waters  of  a  little  creek  come 

rushing  from   a  rocky  cleft  at  Beaver  Dam 

with  a  noise  and  patter  far  exceeding  Lodore,  Clay  Cut>  Chesapeake  and  Ohio  Raflroad. 

which    Mr.   Southey  made  so  many  rhymes    about ;    and  with  picturesqueness 

of  dark  green  in  the  foliage,  and 
brilliant  refractions  and  reflections  of 
broken  sunlight  in  the  descending 
drops. 

At  Covington  one  is  confronted  by 
the  Alleghanies.  Here,  more  than 
two  hundred  miles  from  Richmond, 
a  city  was  once  laid  out,  but  it  has 
never  grown  beyond  the  dimensions 
of  a  village.  Covington  was  to  have 
been  the  western  terminus  of  the 
Virginia  Central  railroad,  and  the 
canal  was  to  have  been  extended  to 
this  point.  A  road  wa.s  to  have  been 
built  from  it  to  the  Ohio  by  the 
State  of  Virginia,  and  the  products 
of  the  mines  and  fields  of  the  West 
were  to  be  reshipped  at  Covington. 
This  was  a  part  of  the  internal  im- 
provement system  which  the  Old 
Dominion  was  inaugurating  when  the 
war  came.  The  great  fight  over, 
Virginia  found  that  she  had  no  funds 
with  which  to  carry  on  the  important 
enterprise,  and  offered  all  that  had 
..,,  been  done  in  improvements  from  Rich- 


THE      DESCENT      TO     THE      "WHITE      SULPHUR." 


669 


mond  to  the  Ohio  river  to  any  company  that  would  complete  the  task.  Both 
Virginia  and  West  Virginia  readily  agreed  upon  a  harmonious  policy  with  regard 
to  the  line,  and  the  Chesapeake  and  Ohio  Company  finished  the  road  on  the 
terms  offered  by  the  two  cpmmonwealths. 


Jerry's  Run. 

At  Jerry's  Run  a  mighty  ravine  has  been  carved  and  cut  away,  to  allow  the 
road  a  passage  among  the  mountains.  For  miles  the  roadway  is  carried  over  a 
succession  of  artificial  embankments  and  through  long  cuttings  in  the  crags. 
The  train  traverses  the  ravine  so  high  above  the  stream  that  the  water  looks  like 
a  silver  thread  .stretched  through  the  valley.  Then,  at  an  elevation  of  more  than 
two  thousand  feet  above  the  level  of  the  sea,  the  road  passes  under  the  mount- 
ains by  the  "Alleghany  Tunnel,"  and  gradually  descends  toward  the  "  Green- 
brier White  Sulphur,"  the  most  noted  of  Southern  watering-places. 


LXXIV. 

GREENBRIER,    WHITE       SULPHUR       SPRINGS  —  FROM       THE      "WHITE 

SULPHUR"      TO      KANAWHA      VALLEY — THE      MINERAL 

SPRINGS     REGION. 


THE  White  Sulphur  Springs  are  situated  on  Howard's  creek,  in  Greenbrier 
county,  West  Virginia,  and  on  the  western  slope  of  the  Appalachian  mount- 
ain chain,  which  separates  the  waters  that  flow  into  Chesapeake  bay  from  those 


Scene  on  the  Greenbrier  River  in  Western  Virginia. 

that  empty  into  the  Mississippi. 
On  the  south  is  Kates'  mountain ; 
on  the  west  the  Greenbrier  range, 
and  northward  and  eastward,  at  a 
distance  of  five  miles  from  the 
springs,  the  Alleghanies  tower  in 
^^tr  '=-  JISlll ~ll|plilE      lovely    confusion.       The    valley    in 

which  the  springs  lie  is  one  of  the 
most  beautiful  in  the  mountain  region  of  the  South.  It  is  planted  with  great 
numbers  of  noble  and  finely-grown  trees,  and  in  early  autumn  the  leaves  of  the 


V1 


"WHITE      SULPHUR     SPRINGS. 


67I 


maple,  the  hickory,  the  oak,  the  chestnut,  the  sweet  gum;  and  the  pine,  vie  in 
color  with  the  gay  toilets  in  which  the  Southern  belles  clothe  themselves  for  the 
final  hops  and  "Germans"  of  the  season.  The  lawn  around  which  the  cottages 
are  grouped  is  rich  in  foliage ;  in  the  hottest  days  of  summer,  when  the  lifeless 
atmosphere  of  Richmond  seems  like  a  curse  suspended  over  the  heads  of  the 
citizens,  the  air  is  cool  and  delightful  at  the  "White  Sulphur." 


The  Hotel  and  Lawn  at  Greenbrier  White  Sulphur  Springs,  West  Virginia. 

All  the  region  round  about  was  once  a  hunting  ground  of  the  Shawnee 
Indians,  who  knew  the  Greenbrier  valley  as  one  of  the  most  frequented  "licks"  of 
the  deer  and  the  elk.  The  valley  takes  its  name  from  the  river,  which  was 
christened  by  old  Colonel  John  Lewis,  an  early  explorer,  who  once  became  entan- 
gled in  a  brier-thicket  on  the  banks  while  exploring,  and  vowed  that  he  would 
ever  after  call  the  stream  Greenbrier.  Toward  the  close  of  the  last  century,  the 
Indians  often  brought  those  of  their  number  afflicted  with  difficult  diseases  to  the 
valley,  where  the  unfortunates  were  speedily  cured  by  drinking  the  water  and 
bathing  in  it. 

But  in  those  days  there  were  no  roads ; .  the  Indians  were  far  from  friendly, 
and  our  revolutionary  fathers  had  neither  the  time  nor  the  money  to  spend  in 
improving  the  beautiful  resort.  The  Virginia  planters  learned  of  its  charms,  and 
as  early  as  1818  the  tract  was  somewhat  improved;  but  it  was  not  until  1837 
that  the  White  Sulphur  Spring  Company  was  formed  by  a  number  of  Virginians, 
who  made  the  place  what  it  is  to-day.  They  erected  a  mammoth  hotel  covering 
an  acre  of  ground ;  surrounded  it  at  a  convenient  distance  with  neat  cottages, 
built  upon  terraces,  on  the  hill-sides  and  on  the  borders  of  the  lawns ;  laid  out 
serpentine  walks,  and  gave  the  hitherto  crude  valley  the  aspect  of  a  fashionable 
watering-place.  The  springs  had  been  frequented,  up  to  the  date  of  these 
changes,  almost  exclusively  by  Southern  people.    The  planters  from  the  lowlands 


6J2 


WHITE      SULPHUR      .IN      THE      SEASON. 


came  in  their  carriages,  attended  by  troops  of  servants,  scattering  plenty  in 
their  path ;  money  flowed  like  water  during  the  two  or  three  months  of  the 
season ;  and  when  the  merry  company  departed  a  wail  of  anguish  went  up  from 
the  mountaineers,  who  saw  their  golden  harvest  checked  for  a  twelvemonth. 
During  the  war  the  place  was  alternately  a  Federal  and  a  Confederate  head- 
quarters. The  cavalry  of  both  armies  clattered  over  the  mountain  roads,  leaving 
destruction  behind  them.      But   the   growth  of  railway  enterprise   in  Virginia, 

during  the  last  dozen  years, 

j[  lv  has    given    the    watering- 

^djNjW  k         T  place  a    railroad;    and    the 

lawns,  the  springs,  and  the 
mountain  roads  of  the 
White  Sulphur  are  rapidly 
gaining  a  national  reputa- 
tion. 

It  must  have  been  a 
tedious  journey  to  the  val- 
ley in  the  days  of  stage- 
coaches and  private  car- 
riages, for  the  springs  lie 
in  a  difficult  mountain 
region.  The  Chesapeake 
and  Ohio  Railroad  Com- 
pany had  to  build  some  of 
its  highest  trestles,  and  dig 
some  of  its  longest  tunnels, 
within  a  few  miles  of 
"White  Sulphur."  At  one 
point  between  Staunton 
and  the  springs,  the  tun- 
nels, within  a  few  minutes' 
ride  of  each  other,  aggre- 
gate more  than  two  miles 
in  length.  One  of  them, 
called  the  "Big  Bend,"  is 
6,400  feet  long. 

Now- a -days,  however, 
the  traveler  may  ensconce 
himself  in  his  berth  in  a  luxurious  sleeping-car  at  Richmond  in  the  evening,  and 
awaken  at  White  Sulphur  in  the  morning,  just  as  the  first  breakfast  bell  is 
warning  the  sleepy  ladies  to  prepare  for  their  conquests  of  the  forenoon.  The 
journey  from  Washington  to  White  Sulphur  occupies  but  fifteen  hours. 

From  July  until  September  the  season  is  at  its  height.  The  trains  bring 
hundreds  of  passengers  every  evening ;  the  cottages  .and  hotels,  as  well  as  the 
few  surrounding  farm-houses,  are  crowded.     The  lawns  are  dotted  with  sprightly 


The  Eastern  Portal  of  Second  Creek  Tunnel,  Chesapeake  and 
Ohio  Railroad. 


SOCIETY     AT      THE 


SPRINGS. 


673 


parties,  representing  the  society  of  every  Southern,  and  latterly  of  most  of  the 
Northern  and  Western  States.  The  "hotel"  is  a  remarkable  structure,  resem- 
bling '  the  "  Kursaal "  at  the  German  baths  rather  than  the  vast  palaces  in 
which  the  habitues  of  Saratoga  dance,  flirt,  eat,  and  sleep  in  the  season.  It  is 
amply  provided  with  long  and  solid  verandas,  with  a  huge  ball-room  and  a 
colossal  reception  parlor.  Between  ball-room  and  parlor  is  a  dining-room  three 
hundred  feet  long,  in  which  twelve  hundred  guests  may  at  once  be  seated.  There 
are  but  few  rooms  for  lodgers  in  the  hotel.  From  the  cottages  on  Alabama, 
Louisiana,  Paradise,  Baltimore,  Virginia,  Georgia,  Wolf,  and  Bachelor  rows,  or  on 
Broadway,  or  in  the  "  Colonnade,"  or  on  "Virginia  Lawn,"  or  at  the  "Spring," 
the  belles  come  skipping  across  the  green  sward  to  dinner,  attired  in  full  evening 
dress.  There  are  never  a  dozen  carriages  at  the  White  Sulphur  during  the 
season.  There  is  no  whirl  and  glitter 
of  ambitious  equipages,  the  whole  life 
and  charm  of  the  society  being  concen- 
trated in  the  mammoth  building  called 
the  hotel.     At  early  morning  the  par- 


A  Mountain  Ride  in  a  Stage-Coach.     [Page  675.] 

lor  is  filled  with  ladies  who  make  their  engagements  for  the  day,  and  with  the 
customary  rows  of  invalids  who  chat  cheerily,  or  listen  to  the  music  of  the  pianos 
or  the  band  upon  the  lawn.  After  breakfast  there  are  sometimes  from  five 
hundred  to  a  thousand  persons  gathered  in  the  parlor,  promenading  for  an  hour, 
after  which  the  crowd  separates  into  small  parties,  who  linger  on  the  verandas, 
or  under  the  oaks,  or  along  the  shaded  paths  in  that  famous  resort  known  as 
the  "  Lovers'  Walk,"  where  hundreds  of  hearts  have  been  broken. 

As  the  hour  for  the  evening  meal,  dinner  or  tea,  according  to  the  visitors' 
taste,  approaches,  the  parlor  is  once  more  crowded.  At  dinner  an  army  of  four 
hundred  waiters  skillfully  supplies  the  guests  with  food.  The  scene  is  novel  and 
dazzling.  Hundreds  of  beautiful  girls  from  every  part  of  the  South,  clad  in  ball- 
room costume,  are  seated  at  the  round  tables  in  the  long  hall.  The  dark-haired, 
languishing  Creole  of  Louisiana  is  contrasted  with  the  robust  and  bewitching 
Kentucky  belle;    the  delicate    blonde  of  Richmond  chats  amicably  with    the 


074  THE      LADIES — A     PLEASURE      RESORT. 

stately  Mississippian ;  the  lovely  Baltimore  ladies  twirl  their  fans  and  frown 
defiance  at  Northern  beaux  ;  the  sparkling  belles  of  Charleston  and  the  pretty 
mountain  maids  from  the  West  Virginian  capital  may  be  seen  side  by  side.  The 
West  and  the  East,  the  South  and  the  North  seem  to  have  forgotten  their  sec- 
tional bickerings,  and  to  have  come  together  in  friendliest  mood.  Ex-Generals 
of  the  Confederate  army — Beauregard,  Johnston,  the  Lees — chat  amicably  with 
United  States  Senators  from  the  North  and  West;  men  who  would  gladly 
have  flown  at  each  other's  throats  a  few  years  ago  now  reviewing  the  war  with 
utmost  calm.  The  South  sends  its  best  representatives  to  the  White  Sulphur 
Springs  every  year,  and  the  result  is  a  delightful,  unostentatious,  cultured 
society.  The  "  hops  "  and  the  Germans .  given  by  the  fashionable  Philadelphia 
and  New  York  ladies  are  the  only  dissipations ;  neither  regattas,  nor  horse-races, 
nor  tumultuous  tumbling  in  surf  distract  one.  Every  morning  the  groups  gather 
in  the  pavilion,  under  which  the  sulphur  water  bubbles  up  from  the  spring ;  the 
young  ladies  make  the  wonted  wry  faces  over  the  unsavory  beverage;  while  the 
venerable  planters  from  the  lowlands,  with  many  a  thought  upon  their  damaged 
livers  and  yellow  faces,  swallow  the  fluid  as  if  it  were  nectar. 

"  Greenbrier  White  Sulphur,"  as  the  Southerners  call  it,  is  a  pleasure  resort. 
Not  one-tenth  of  the  throng  which  crowds  cottages  and  hotel  in  the  season 
comes  to  regain  its  health.  It  comes  rather  to  rejoice  in  a  superabundance  of 
life. and  vigor.  But  the  waters  are  singularly  efficacious  in  many  obstinate  dis- 
eases.*    As  an  alterative  they  have  no  superior.     The  effect  of  a  free  use  of  the 

*  The  White  Sulphur  Water  was  analyzed  in  1842,  by  Professor  Hayes,  of  Boston,  with 
the  following  results : 

"  Fifty  thousand  grains  (about  seven  pints)  of  the  water  contain,  in  solution, 
3.633  water-grain  measures  of  gaseous  matter,  or  about  1.14  of  its 
volume,   consisting  of — 

Nitrogen  gas 1.013 

Oxygen  gas 108 

Carbonic  acid 2.444 

Hydro-sulphuric  acid 068 

3-633 
"  One  gallon,  or  237  cubic  inches,  of  the  water,  contains  16.739-1000  cubic  inches 

of  gas,  having  the  proportion  of — 

Nitrogen  gas 4.680 

Oxygen  gas 498 

Carbonic  acid : 11.290 

Hydro-sulphuric  acid 271 

16.739 
"Fifty  thousand  grains  of  this  water  contain  1 15.735-1000  grains  of  saline  matter 
consisting  of — 

Sulphate  of  lime 67. 168 

Sulphate  of  magnesia 30.364 

Chloride  of  magnesium 859 

Carbonate  of  lime  ' 6.060 

Organic   matter   (dried  at  2120  F.) 3-740 

Carbonic  acid 4. 584 

Silicates   (silica   1.34,  potash  .18,  soda  .66,  and  a  trace  of  oxide  of  iron)       2.960 

115.735" 


OTHER      "SPRING        RESORTS. 


675 


Anvil  Rock,  Greenbrier  River. 


waters  much  resembles  that  produced  by  mercury,  without  any  of  the  dis- 
agreeable contingencies  attendant  on  the  employment  of  that  medicine.  The 
sulphur  baths,  which  constitute  one  of  the  attractions  of  the  place  even  for  well 

people,  are  admirably  kept.  A  visit 
to  the  spring,  a  bath,  and  a  horseback 
ride  among  the  mountains,  or  a  walk 
along  "Dry  Creek"  before  break- 
fast, will  certainly  fit  one  for  the 
fatigues  of  the  merry  "  evening,"  even 
if  there  be  a  "German"  which  lasts 
until  daybreak. 

Within  a  radius  of  forty  miles  from 
the  Greenbrier  White  Sulphur  lies  the 
most  interesting  portion  of  the  Vir- 
ginia Springs  region.  Northward  are 
those  already  mentioned,  the  Hot,  the 
Warm,  the  Healing,  and  the  Alum 
Springs.  Seventeen  miles  eastward  from  the  White  Sulphur  are  the  Sweet 
Springs;  twenty-four  miles  to  the  south  the  Salt  Sulphur;  forty-one  miles  to  the 
south  the  Red  Sulphur ;  and  twenty-two  miles  to  the  west  the  Blue  Sulphur.  At 
all  these  springs  fine  hotels  have  been  built,  and  as  the  season  wanes  at  one  it 
waxes  at  another,  so  that  one  may  make  a  jolly  round  for  three  or  four  months. 
At  some  of  these  resorts  the  furnish- 
ings of  the  cottages  are  primitive,  and 
one  sadly  misses  the  elegance  of  city 
life ;  but  the  natural  beauties  and  the 
delicious  atmosphere  amply  compen- 
sate for  all  other  deficiencies.  Al- 
though most  of  the  Springs  are  now 
either  directly  accessible  by  rail,  or 
within  easy  distance  of  the  railroads, 
it  is  the  fashion  to  make  the  tour  in 
such  a  stage  as  our  artist  has  given  a 
picture  of,  although  the  passes  in  the 
mountains  are  rarely  as  rough  as  they 
are  depicted  in  the  engraving.  Many 
parties  adjourn  to  the  Old  Sweet 
Springs  after  the  season  at  the  Green- 
brier is  over,  stopping  on  the  way  for 
picnics.  The  "  Old  Sweet"  always  has 
a  company  of  distinguished  guests. 
It  is  located  in  a  charming  valley  in 
the   eastern   part  of  Monroe  county,  a  West  Virginia -Countryman." 

with  the  high  Sweet  Spring  mountain  on  the  south,  and  the  Alleghanies  only 
a  mile  away.     The  buildings  are  elegant  and  commodious ;  the  lawns  as  beauti- 


6j6         THE   RED   SWEET,   THE   RED,   AND   BLUE   SULPHUR  SPRINGS. 

ful  and  richly  studded  with  trees  as  those  in  the  Greenbrier  valley.  The  baths 
are  frequented  from  dawn  until  dusk  by  crowds  who  represent  the  best  talent  of 
the  West  and  South.  The  predominance  of  carbonic  acid  in  the  waters  of  these 
springs  induces  physicians  to  recommend  invalids  who  have  been  drinking  the 
White  Sulphur  water  for  some  time  to  try  those  of  the  "  Old  Sweet"  for  per- 
fecting and  fixing  the  cure  already  reasonably  well  established. 

The  Red  Sweet  Spring,  situated  but  one  mile  from  the  Old  Sweet,  is  one  of 
the  prettiest  retreats  in  the  mountains.     The  chalybeate  and  tonic  waters  annu- 


"■■'■'J   ;.!-■    P7\,  ."■■■  :'^J>~H&^l?%%Jfe 


A  Freighters'  Camp,  West  Virginia.     [Page  679. 


ally  draw  hundreds  of  visitors  to  them.  The  Salt  Sulphur,  shut  in  among  the 
mountains  near  the  town  of  Union,  has  three  springs,  one  of  which  is  called  the 
"  Iodine,"  and  is  strongly  recommended  for  chronic  affections  of  the  brain,  and 
for  nervous  diseases.  The  Red  Sulphur,  in  the  southern  portion  of  Monroe 
county,  is  romantically  situated  on  Indian  creek,  in  a  deep  ravine  to  which  the 
traveler  descends  along  the  side  of  a  picturesque  mountain.  The  waters  of  this 
spring  have  been  found  a  powerful  adjunct  in  the  management  of  difficult  cases 
of  phthisis  and  consumption.     At  the  "  Blue  Sulphur"  a  spacious  hotel,  a  beauti- 


POLITICS     AT     THE     SPRINGS. 


677 


ful  lawn,  and  a  fine  establishment  of  medicated  baths  are  the  attractions  grouped 
about  the  spring,  which  is  covered  by  an  imposing  temple.* 

The  Northerner  is  especially  welcome  at  all  these  watering-places.  There  is 
none  of  the  bitterness  and  occasional  small  spite  manifested  toward  him  which  he 
might  perhaps  encounter  in  some  of  the  Southern  capitals.  The  courtesy  and 
hospitality  of  the  Virginians  are  proverbial ;  their  frankness  and  kindliness  toward 
strangers  are  shown  in  their  best  light  at  the  "  Springs."  The  subject  of  politics 
is  pretty  thoroughly  eschewed  at  White  Sulphur  during  the  season,  except  when 
the  President  goes  there  to  hear  what  the  Southern  politicians  have  to  say,  or 
when  some  injudicious  relict  of  the  late  war  utters  something  fiery  at  a  reunion 
or  a  convention.     The  whole  company  of  distinguished  Southerners  at  White 


"  The  rude  cabin  built  beneath  the  shadow  of  a  huge  rock. "     [  Page  679.  ] 

Sulphur,  in  1873,  condemned  the  bitter  and  hostile  speech  made  by  Jefferson 
Davis  at  a  meeting  of  the  Southern  Historical  Society  at  the  "  Montgomery 
White  "  that  season.  The  Northern  or  Western  man  at  these  springs  is  never 
likely  to  hear  disagreeable  sentiments  unless  he  provokes  them  by  illiberality  on 
his  own  part.  He  will  find  the  Southern  people  assembled  there  amply  able  to 
take  a  fair  and  dispassionate  view  of  our  national  politics.  Gentlemen  of  culture 
and  refinement  will  show  him  how  possible  it  was  for  the  South  to  believe  that  it 
was  right  in  the  war.  But  all  will  convince  him  that  they  are  much  more  inter- 
ested in  the  material  development  of  the  Southern  States  than  in  quarreling  over 
*  See  appendix  for  complete  table  of  routes  in  and  about  the  Virginia  Springs  region. 


6?8 


WEST     VIRGINIA   S      CHARACTERISTICS. 


old  issues.     Leading  politicians  will  now  and  then  intimate  that  some  day  the 
Southern  State  Constitutions  will  be  amended;    and  from  this  it  will  be  easy 

to  perceive  that  the  South  is  not  yet 
reconciled  to  reconstruction. 

The  Springs  region  of  Virginia 
seems  likely  to  become  a  favorite 
meeting- ground  for  Northern  and 
Southern  people.  As  soon  as  the 
Chesapeake  and  Ohio  railroad  was 
opened  to  the  Ohio  river,  Cincinnati 
sent  a  large  quota  of  visitors  to  the 
"  Greenbrier  White  Sulphur,"  and  the 
Virginians  have  found,  much  to  their 
surprise,  that  there  is  a  fair  share  of 
culture  and  manners  at  the  West.  The 
free  and  friendly  intercourse  between 
citizens  of  the  different  sections,  which 
has  been  the  result  of  yearly  visits  to 
the  charming  resorts  in  the  mountains 
of  Virginia  and  West  Virginia,  cannot 
fail  to  have  an  influence  for  good  in 
their  future  political  relations.  The 
wild  life  of  the  mountaineers,  and  the 
strange  humors  and  habits  of  the  negroes  scattered  through  the  Springs  region, 
offer  an  interesting  study  to  the  visitor  from  the  North  and  West.  The  country 
in  the  vicinity  of  the  White   Sulphur 


Springs  has  many  prosperous  farms ; 
fine  cattle  are  to  be  seen  in  the  fields ; 
the  grazing  is  excellent  the  year  round. 
West  Virginia  does  not  bear  the 
aspect  of  a  slave  State;  its  farms  have 
the  same  thoroughly  cultured  and  well- 
kept  appearance  as  those  at  the  North. 
But  few  slaves  were  owned  in  the 
mountain  region  ;  the  wealthy  families 
had  some  house-servants  who,  as  a 
rule,  still  remain  with  them.  The 
negroes  who  come  to  these  mountain 
regions  from  the  lowlands  seem  to 
thrive.  They  proved  themselves  one 
of  the  most  useful  laboring  forces  that 
could  be  employed  in  the  building  of 
the    new    railroad.     They  were  en- 


"The  rustic  mill  built  of  logs. 


[Page  679.] 


The  Junction  of  Greenbrier  and  New  Rivers. 


dowed  with  vigorous  health,  were  easily  managed,  sober,  and  quick  to   learn. 
The    beautiful    Greenbrier    river   flows    downward    from  Greenbrier    mountain 


NEW     RIVER ITS      RAPIDS. 


679 


through  Pocahontas,  Greenbrier,  and  Monroe  counties,  to  unite  with  the  New 
river,  which  rises  in  North  Carolina,  and  courses  through  some  of  the  most 
romantic  mountain  scenery  in  West  Virginia,  until  it  meets  and  joins  with  the 
Great  Kanawha  river  at  the  entrance  of  the  famous  Kanawha  valley.  Along  the 
Greenbrier  "and  New  rivers  adventurous  boatmen  ply  in  "  batteaux,"  carrying 
merchandise  or  travelers  who  wish  to  explore  the  wonders  of  the  New  River 
canon.  The  lofty  and  thickly-wooded  hills ;  the  vales  carpeted  with  flowers  and 
overhung  by  giant  trees ;  the  camps  of  the  "  freighters  "  who  transport  goods 
over  the  rough  roads  along  or  near  the  banks ;  the  rustic  mill  built  of  logs,  and 
insecurely  set  beside  some  treacherous  hill-side  stream ;  the  rude  cabin  beneath 
the  shade  of  a  huge  rock;  and  the  types  of  "countryman,"  inquisitive  and  sus- 
picious— all  are  strangely  interesting, 
and  amply  repay  the  traveler  for  the 
fatigues  of  the  journey. 

Our  artists,  who  made  the   tour  of 

the  New  river  canon  in  a  batteau,  found 

it    an    exciting    experience.       At    the 

junction    of  the    Greenbrier    and    New 

rivers    they  engaged  one  of  the   boats 

used  in  running  the 

rapids.      This  boat 

was  sixty  feet  long 


% 


,L-'-* 


Descending  the  New  River  Rapids. 


fJ*tiqL/K<i.f<. 


by  six  wide,  and  was  managed  by  three  negroes, — the  "steersman,"  who  guided 
the  boat  with  a  long  and  powerful  oar ;  the  headsman,  who  stood  on  the  bow  to 
direct  the  steersman  by  waving  his  arms ;  and  an  extra  hand,  who  assisted  with 
an  oar  in  the  eddies  and  smooth  parts  of  the  river.  The  merry  artists  not  only 
found  time  for  exciting  scrambles  along  the  rocky  banks,  in  search  of  pictures, 
but  even  when  descending  the  New  River  rapids  managed  to  obtain  the  necessary 
notes  from  which  to  give  the  world  a  faithful  representation  of  the  event. 

The  country  near  the  junction  of  the  Greenbrier  with  the  New  river  literally 
stands  on  end.  The  people  live  on  hill- slopes  so  steep  that  the  horses  can  hardly 
keep  their  footing  when  they  plough ;  and  it  is  sometimes  said  that  the  farmers 
in  the  canon  stand  on  one  bank  and  shoot  their  seed  corn  into  the  field  on  the 
other  from  a  rifle. 

The  New  River  canon  is  one  of  the  most  remarkable  natural  wonders  of  the 
eastern  portion  of  the  United  States.     It  is  a  deep  crack  in  the  earth,  a  hundred 


68o 


THE     NEW     RIVER     CANON. 


miles  long,  a  mile  wide  at  the  summit,  from  eight  to  fifteen  hundred  feet  deep, 
and  traversed  at  its  bottom  by  a  turbulent  stream.  The  railroad  builders  found 
this  canon  practicable  for  the  passage  of  their  route.  They  blasted  out  fragments 
of  rock  until  they  had  made  a  shelf  along  the  perpendicular  rocky  side  of  the 
canon.  Entering  this  strange  gorge  by  train,  one  scarcely  realizes  that  he  is 
hundreds  of  feet  below  the  level  of  the  surrounding  country.  The  scenery  is 
grand.  The  journey  along  the  rocky  shelf,  whence  one  can  look  upon  the  enor- 
mous masses  of  stone  hurled  down  to  make  room  for  the  track,  or  look  up  to 
the  streams  of  water  flowing  from  the  sides  of  the  cliffs,  is  an  experience  never 
to  be  forgotten. 

But  there  is  one  remarkable  characteristic  of  the  canon  which  the  traveler 
through  it  by  rail  or  in  batteau  will  notice  with  care.  He  will  observe  that  the 
stratification  of  the  rocks  is  very  singular;  that  they  lie  evidently  as  they  were 
deposited ;  that  there  has  been  no  upheaval,  no  disorganization.  The  earth 
has  simply  been  cracked  asunder,  and  the  traveler  is  able  to  enter,  without 
difficulty,  a  coal-shaft  which  is  open  to  the  sunlight,  and  through  which  a  rail- 
road runs. 

A  coal-shaft  ?  Yes  ;  out  of  the  high  bank  a  coal-seam  crops.  In  some  places 
many  seams  are  visible.  The  railroad  has  here  and  there  cut  through  veins  of 
the  best  cannel  coal,  and  the  miner  has  only  to  dig  into  the  mountain.  The  mine 
drains  itself,  and  the  precious  mineral  is  dumped  directly  into  cars  which  carry  it 
to  Richmond.  In  1871  it  was  impossible  to  ride  through  this  canon  on  horse- 
back. Now  it  is  as  easily  accessible  as  any  manufacturing  town  in  the  North. 
The  coal  and  limestone  in  this  New  River  valley  lie  within  a  hundred  miles  of 
some  of  the  richest  and  most  important  deposits  of  iron  ore  in  the  United  States. 


A  hard  road  for  artists  to  travel. 


LXXV. 


jm 


THE     KANAWHA     VALLEY — MINERAL     WEALTH     OF     WESTERN 

VIRGINIA. 

EMERGING  from  the  New  River  canon,  one  reaches  the  Great  Falls  of  the 
Kanawha,  a  stream  formed  by  the  junction  of  the  New  and  Gauley 
rivers.  The  country  sur- 
rounding was  the  scene 
during  the  late  war  of  much 
strife  between  the  Federal 
Rosecrans  and  Wise  and 
other  Confederate  officers. 
A  few  miles  from  Kanawha 
Falls,  in  the  direction  of 
Greenbrier  White  Sulphur, 
the  "  Hawk's  Nest,"  an  im- 
posing bluff  rising  a  thou- 
sand feet  above  the  bed  of 
the  New  river,  frowns  upon 
the  railroad.  From  this 
height,  to  which  a  winding 
path  leads,  one  may  look 
down  over  perfect  valleys, 
unsurpassed    by    those    of 

Rhine  or  Moselle.     The 

scene  at  Miller's  Ferry, 

where  the  stream    winds 

through    deep    recesses    in 

the  hills,  is  one  of  the  most 

sublime  in  the  South.     The 

"Richmond"    and    "Big 

Dowdy"  Falls  on  the  New 

river,    and    "Whitcomb's 

Boulder,"    in    this   vicinity, 

are  worthy  of  the  traveler's 

attention. 

The  Kanawha  and  Ohio 


The  "Hawk's  Nest,"  from  Boulder  Point. 


valley,  or  trans- Appalachian  region,  which  lies  along  the  western  foot  slopes  of 
the  Alleghany  range,  has  an  area  of  seventeen  thousand  five  hundred  square 


682 


MINERAL      WEALTH      OF      THE      KANAWHA      VALLEY. 


Great  Kanawha  Falls.      [Page  681.] 


miles  in  West  Virginia.     Most  of  this  area  is  seamed  with  wonderful  strata  of 
bituminous,  splint,  and  cannel  coal.      Its  agricultural  advantages  also  are    con- 
siderable, tobacco,  corn,  and  root  crops 
paying  well.     As  a  live-stock  country, 
this  valley  resembles  the  "blue-grass" 
lands  of   Kentucky,  which  join  it  on 
the  west.    The  farmers  are  industrious, 
intelligent,  and  reasonably  prosperous. 
But  the  mineral  wealth  of  the  Ka- 
nawha valley  now  usurps  all  the  atten- 
tion directed  to  that  quarter.   The  coal- 
measures  there  actually  cover  sixteen 
thousand  square  miles.      They  make 
their  appearance   at  the   surface,  in   the  New  River  and   Kanawha  valleys,  to 
the  number  of  fourteen  distinct  strata,  "  with  an  aggregate  thickness  in  some 

places  of  one  hundred  feet, 
more  than  half  of  which  is 
in  workable  seams  from 
three  to  eight  feet  thick." 
The  coal  crops  out  on  the 
hill-si  les,  high  above  the 
water  and  railroad  levels,  al- 
lowing easy  and  inexpensive 
excavation.  The  testimony 
of  Mr.  Howell  Fisher  upon 
this  point  is  as  follows  : 

"  In  respect  to  conditions 
most  essential  to  cheap  and 
profitable  working,  this  re- 
gion stands  unrivaled.  The 
chasm  of  the  river  renders  it 
most  peculiar  service,  in  its 
relation  to  the  coal.  Cutting 
all  the  coal  strata  for  nearly 
its  whole  length  entirely 
through,  and  getting  down 
among  the  shales  under  the 
coal,  the  river  has  caused 
the  numerous  streams  which 
pierce  the  whole  coal  region 
to  cut  down  through  most 
of  the  coal-bearing  strata  on 
their  courses,  leaving  the 
coal  entirely  above  water- 
„„.  HjlA!  level,  accessible  at  hundreds 


EASY     ACCESS     TO     ITS     COAL. 


683 


of  points  by  simply  scraping  off  the  surface  soil,  so  that,  as  far  as  the  mere  get- 
ting of  coal  is  concerned,  two  thousand  dollars  will  open  a  mine  ready  to  ship 
one  thousand  tons  per  week.  There  is  no  region  in  the  world  where  less 
physical  labor  will  prepare  a  mine  for  the  delivery  of  coal  at  the  drift's  mouth. 

"  This  will  be  made  clearer  by  a  comparison  of  the  position  of  coal  here  and 
in  Great  Britain  in  this  respect.  In  Great  Britain,  and  in  fact  in  almost  all  of  the 
European  coal-fields,  the  coal  is  deep  below  the  water-level.  To  reach  the 
seams  requires  the  expenditure  of  years  of  labor  and  vast  sums  of  money  in 
sinking  shafts  or  pits,  and  in  erecting  pumping  and  hoisting  machinery,. to  be 
maintained  and  renewed  at  heavy  annual  expense.  It  is  authoritatively  stated 
that  the  cost  of  sinking  shafts  in  the  Newcastle  region  of  England  to  the  depth 
of  one  thousand  feet,  has  been,  in  many  instances,  one  thousand  dollars  per 
yard.  In  the  great  Northern  coal-field  of  Great  Britain,  producing  twenty  mil- 
lion tons  per  annum,  there  are  two  hundred  pits  or  shafts,  costing,  in  first  outlay, 


rs&zrxzz*£»-  ,rc 


Richmond  Falls,  New  River.     [Page  681.] 

for  sinking  and  machinery,  fifty  millions  of  dollars,  to  which  must  be  added  the 
necessary  expense  of  constructing  and  maintaining  proper  air-courses,  and  their 
accessories  requisite  to  the  safety  of  the  employes. 

"  Now  in  this  great  Kanawha  coal-field  nature  has  already  sunk  all  the  neces- 
sary pits  and  shafts,  which  need  neither  repair,  renewal,  nor  labor  to  work  them. 
The  laws  of  gravity  have  provided  the  most  perfect,  permanent,  and  costless 
pumping  machinery;  and  the  ventilation  of  the  mine  and  safety  of  the  employes, 
instead  of  requiring  scientific  knowledge  and  anxious  thought,  is  simply  a  matter 
of  the  most  ordinary  care,  the  freedom  from  noxious  gases  being  the  natural 
result  of  the  position  of  the  coal  strata." 

There  is  coal  enough  along  the  line  of  the  railroads  and  rivers  in  this  favored 
section  to  supply  the  American  market  for  several  centuries.  Professor  Ansted, 
of  England,  explored  this  region  nearly  a  quarter  of  a  century  ago,  and  gave 
his  testimony  at  a  meeting  of  the  Society  of  Arts  in  London,  two  or  three  years 
since,  that  "  there  was  no  coal-field  more  important  than  that  of  Virginia ; 
44 


684 


TESTIMONY     OF      PROFESSOR     HOTCHKISS. 


none  where  the  coal-seams  were  more  accessible  or  of  a  better  quality.  The 
coal-fields  in  the  Appalachian  range  were  nearly  all  horizontal,  intersected  by 
convenient  valleys,  could  be  worked  from  numerous  points  at  the  same  time  with, 
ease,  and  might  be  looked  upon  as  inexhaustible." 


Big  Dowdy  Falls,  near  New  River.     [Page  681.] 


Professor  Hotchkiss,  of  Staunton,  Virginia,  in  a  paper  on  the  Resources  of  the 
State,  speaks  as  follows  of  the  Kanawha  coal-field  : 

"  On  the  eastern  border  the  seams  of  the  lower  coal-measures  are  found,  having  an  exposed 
aggregate  thickness  of  some  fifty  feet  in  the  gorge  of  New  river — the  line  of  the  Chesapeake  and 
Ohio  railway — a  canon  from  1,200  to  1,500  feet  below  the  general  level  of  the  country.  One  of 
these  seams  is  over  six  feet  thick,  furnishing  a  good  coking  coal;  another  seam  of  block  coal  is 
four  and  a-half  feet  thick.  There  are  several  other  seams  three  and  four  feet  in  thickness, 
furnishing  bituminous  coals  of  good  quality.  These  seams  have  only  a  moderate  inclination  to  the 
north-west,  and  are  all  above  the  river  and  railroad-level.  These  lower  measures  descend  more 
rapidly  than  the  rivers,  and  so  pass  beneath  the  water-level  some  fifty  miles  from  their  eastern. 


ARRANGEMENT     AND      THICKNESS      OF     STRATA. 


685 


outcrop.  The  strata  of  the  upper  coals  come  to  the  horizon  as  the  mouth  of  New  river  is  ap- 
proached, and  not  far  below  the  junction  of  that  river  with  the  Gauley  to  form  the  Great  Kana- 
wha. At  Armstrong's  creek,  a  section  in  the  600  feet  of  bluff  above  the  level  of  the  Kanawha 
shows  thirteen  seams  of  coal  varying  in  thickness  from  two  and  a-half  to  nine  feet,  with  an  aggre- 
gate of  sixty-one  feet.  Below  this  place,  at  Cannelton,  on  the  other  side  of  the  Kanawha,  there 
are  five  seams  of  coal  open,  in  the  1,300  feet  of  the  face  of  the  bluff,  aggregating  twenty-nine 
feet.  More  than  100  feet  of  stratified  coal  has  been  proved  here.  The  seams  vary  from  eight 
to  fourteen  feet  in  thickness,  and  embrace  gas,  shop,  splint,  and  cannel  varieties.  The  seam 
producing  the  cannel  is  double,  giving  four  feet  of  cannel  and  two  and  a-half  of  splint  coal. 
This  cannel  will  yield  sixty  gallons  of  oil  to  the  ton  of  2,000  lbs.     A  section  on  Cabin  creek  and 


600  Ft. 


Thick. 


7-6 


5-6  Cannel 
Flint  Vein. 

7-  Stockton's 

Cannel. 
2-6 


11-  Splint. 

.  r  Pyritoi 
3  °  bitumii 

4-  Cannel. 
6     ^~s 


3-6 
-6 

J  2-6 

U- 

,'6-6 
i6-6 


,^\ 


Level  of  Armstrong's  Creek. 
Section  of  Kanawha  Coal-Seams. 


Whitcomb's   Boulder.     [Page  681.] 


vicinity,  ten  miles  below  Cannelton,  by  Prof.  Ansted,  gives  sixty-eight  feet  of  coal,  in  some 
thirteen  seams,  varying  from  two  and  a-half  to  eleven  feet ;  twenty-two  feet  of  these  seams  are 
cannel  and  from  seven  to  eleven  splint  coal.  At  Campbell's  creek,  still  lower  down  the  river,  in 
the  400  feet  of  bluff,  are  six  seams,  from  four  and  a-half  to  six  feet  thick,  that  furnish  twenty- 
nine  feet  of  coal.  This  coal  is  peculiar  in  its  formation.  Near  Clay  Court-House,  on  Elk  river, 
the  coal  strata  are  from  four  and  a-half  to  eleven  feet  thick,  making  forty-one  feet  of  coal  in  the 
500  feet  of  bluff;  nineteen  feet  of  the  coal  being  splint  and  six  cannel.  At  the  mouth  of  Coal 
river  a  stratum  of  coal,  from  four  to  eight  feet  thick,  is  found  at  a  depth  of  300  feet ;  of  course 
the  other  seams  are  found  there  also,  but  at  greater  depths.  These  may  be  considered  fair 
samples  of  the  sections  throughout  this  great  coal-field,  ample  enough  to  satisfy  the  wants  of  un- 
told generations,  and  so  accessible  as  to  require  no  special  skill  in  mining ;   nor  expenditure  for 


686 


MINERAL     WEALTH     OF     THE      BLUE      RIDGE. 


drainage  and  ventilation.  The  Baltimore  and  Ohio  railway,  with  its  Parkersburg  and  Wheeling 
arms  and  numerous  branches,  now  crosses  the  northern  part  of  this  field  and  opens  it  to  markets. 
The  Chesapeake  and  Ohio  railway  has  just  crossed  it  in  the  south,  where  the  Great  Miner  has 
'  torn  asunder  the  mountains,'  and  well  and  wisely  cut  an  open  gangway,  more  than  a  thousand 
feet  deep,  across  the  rich  strata,  exposed  them  to  daylight,  and  at  the  same  time  made  way  for 
the  railroad,  at  very  low  grades,  to  carry  this  '  bottled  sunshine'  to  the  great  markets.  The 
coals  found  here  are  used  in  making  iron  without  coking,  and  the  choice  for  any  special  purpose 
is  very  great,  the  quality  being  unexceptionally  good." 

Cannelton,  mentioned  by  Professor  Hotchkiss,  was  established  by  a  Rhode 
Island  company,  who  built  works  there  for  the  milling  of  coal  into  oil.  Just 
as  the  work  was  progressing  fairly,  the  oil  region  of  Pennsylvania  was  dis- 
covered, and  the  proprietors  of  Can- 
nelton, unable  to  compete  with  the 
flowing  wells  of  Titusville,  closed  their 
works,  for  without  transportation  facili- 
ties their  coal  was  worthless.  But  with 
the  advent  of  the  railroad  came  a  for- 
tune into  their  hands,  and  to-day  they 
let  coal  down  an  inclined  plane  1,100 
feet  long  from  the  almost  perpen- 
dicular side  of  the  mountain,  directly 
into  cars  waiting  on  side  tracks  to 
receive  it. 

In  previous  chapters  I  have  given 
some  idea  of  the  extent  of  the  stores 
of  iron  in  South-western  Virginia  and 
the  Piedmont  country.  The  deposits 
of  iron  ore  are  no  less  remarkable 
along  the  line  of  the  Chesapeake  and 
Ohio  road.  In  that  part  of  Piedmont 
penetrated  by  this  line,  there  are  hem- 
atite and  magnetic  ores  of  the  best 
quality.  In  the  spurs  of  the  Blue 
The  inclined  Plane  at  Cannelton.  Ridge,    near    Fisherville,    a    seam    of 

hematite  ores  exists,  and  rich  lodes  .of  hematite  and  specular  ores  are  found 
running  along  the  foot  of  the  Blue  Ridge ;  at  intervals,  in  the  whole  breadth 
of  the  Shenandoah  valley;  "and  in  continuous  seams  of  great  thickness  along 
the  north  and  parallel  mountains  beyond." 

"The  mineral  wealth  of  the  Blue  Ridge,"  says  Professor  Hotchkiss,  "is  great, 
and  destined  to  be  quite  important,  from  its  nearness  to  the  sea-board.  In  the 
ranges  of  foot-hills  lying  along  the  western  base  of  these  mountains,  the  whole 
three  hundred  or  more  miles  of  their  length,  are  found  very  extensive  deposits 
of  brown  hematite  iron  ores  of  the  best  character,  giving  from  sixty  to  seventy- 
five  per  cent,  of  metallic  iron  in  the  yield  of  the  furnace.  It  is  not  correct  to 
say  that  these  deposits  are  continuous,  and  yet  they  have  been  so  regularly  found, 
when  sought  after,  as  almost  to  justify  the  use  of  that  term.     In  some  places  they 


FURNACES ORE-POCKETS LIMESTONE. 


687 


are  deeply  buried  in  the  debris  of  the  mountain ;  at  others  they  show  themselves 
as  interstratified  masses,  conforming  for  long  distances  to  the  formations  of  the 
district,  as  near  where  New  river  leaves  the  Ridge,  at  Radford  Furnace,  where 
the  stratum  is  over  thirty  feet  in  thickness,  while  at  other  places  the  ore,  in  a  soft 
state,  forms  hill-like  masses,  as  at  the  Shenandoah  Iron  Works,  in  Rockingham. 
At  one  place  in  Rockbridge,  where  the  stratification  is  nearly  vertical,  striking 
with  the  mountain,  this  one  appears  as  a  hard  central  stratum,  forming  the  crest 
of  a  spur  more  than  600  feet  above  its  base.  The  western  flank  of  the  table- 
land in  the  south-west  is  known  as  the  Iron  mountain,  from  the  quantity  of  this 
ore  there  exposed.  There  are  numerous  furnaces  now  in  blast,  and  others  are 
being  built  along  the  line  of  these  deposits,  making  charcoal  iron  of  a  high  char- 
acter, such  as  now  readily  commands  sixty  dollars  a  ton  in  the  United  States. 
One  of  these  had  a  yield  of  sixty-five  per  cent,  of  iron  from  the  ore  put  into  the 
furnace  in  the  run  of  a  season.     Between  these  hematites  and  the  main  ridge  is 

found    a   deposit   of    specular 
iron-stone." 

In  the  slopes  of  the  North 
mountain  there  are  numerous 
lodes  or  pockets  of  ore  inter- 
stratified with  limestone.  The 
ore-beds  in  the  western  por- 
tion of  Augusta  county,  and 
in  one  or  two  adjacent  coun- 
ties in  Virginia  proper,  are 
very  extensive.  Their  aston- 
ishing bulk  and  their  conven- 
ient position  near  the  surface 
have  prompted  trustworthy 
experts  to  declare  them  among 
the  most  remarkable  on  the 
continent.  From  Gordonsville 
in  the  Piedmont  district,  to 
Huntington  on  the  Ohio  river, 
a  distance  of  three  hundred 
and  twenty- five  miles  by  the 
railway  line,  there  is  a  constant 
succession  of  minerals.  All  the 
elements  of  successful  and  pro- 
fitable coal  mining  and  manu- 
facture are  there  found  closely 

Fern  Spring  Branch,  a  West  Virginia  Mountain  Stream.  associated.        The    iron  Ores  are 

rich  and  of  great  variety  ;  the  carboniferous  limestone  is  excellent  for  fluxing  pur- 
poses, and  there  are  inexhaustible  stores  of  coal.  In  Greenbrier  valley  the  lime- 
stone is  bordered  by  deposits  of  ore  on  one  side,  by  coal-measures  on  the  other.* 

*  See  appendix  for  article  on  the  Iron  of  the  Virginias. 


688 


CHARLESTON  —  ITS     GROWTH 


Charleston,  the   capital   of  West  Virginia,  is    pleasantly  situated    near   the 
confluence  of  the   Elk  and   Kanawha  rivers,  in  a  bold  mountain  country.     A 


M£% 


ft 


easily  mined. 


Charleston,  the  West  Virginia  Capital. 

• 

steamboat  plies  between  the  city 
and  the  railroad  depot  on  the  steep 
side  of  a  rocky  ledge.  The  deck 
hands  may  any  day  be  seen  shovel- 
ing coal  from  a  vein  in  the  river- 
bank  into  the  coal-bunkers  of  the 
steamer,  and  in  the  hills  which  over- 
hang' the  stream  veins  crop  out  at 
*  ■•--  points    where    they    can    be    very 

At  the  close  of  the  war  Charleston  was  a  small  village,  but  its 
selection  as  the  State  capital,  and  the  completion  of  the  Chesapeake  and  Ohio 

railroad,   gave   it   a   new  start.  

It  now  has  three  or  four  thous- 
and population  ;  a  cultured  so- 
ciety ;  one  of  the  best  hotels  in 
the  South,  the  Hale  House ;  an 
elegant  State  capitol ;  an  opera 
house;  fine  structures  for 
schools  and  churches,  and  many 
handsome  private  mansions. 
For  forty  years  before  the  war 
the  people  of  Charleston  were 
wealthy  and  cultured.  The  salt- 
mills  and  furnaces  along  the 
Kanawha,  and    the   cultivation  ,    ,    ,    , . 

,  ..   .ij.i.^..*  ^c  jjajc  House — Charleston. 


COMMERCE      OF      CHARLESTON,      WEST      VIRGINIA. 


689 


of  the  fertile  bottom  lands,  brought  plenty  and  prosperity.  But  no  farmer  or 
land-owner  ever  thought  of  opening  coal  mines — of  developing  the  riches  which 
they  daily  trampled  under  their  feet.  Even  to-day  the  old-school  farmers  seem 
hardly  to  appreciate  the  value  of  their  mineral  lands,  and  show  a  decided  disin- 
clination to  develop  them.  When  they  can  get  what  they  consider  a  good  price, 
they  will  gladly  sell ;  but  they  cannot  be  induced  to  risk  much  of  their  own 
capital  in  mining.  Charleston  is  the  central  point  and  the  most  convenient  outlet 
for  five  great  sections  of  Western  Virginia,  all  of  which  in  a  few  years  will  doubt- 
less be  provided  with  railroads.  There  is  no  city  within  one  hundred  miles  of  it 
which  can  become  a  rival  in  the  lumber,  coal,  salt,  and  manufacturing  interests 


Rafts  of  Saw- Logs  on  a  West  Virginia  River. 

of  the  Kanawha,  Elk,  and  Coal  River  valleys.  The  lumber  trade  along  the  Elk 
river  is  very  important ;  hundreds  of  rafts  are  floated  down  that  stream  to  the 
mouth  of  the  Kanawha,  and  thence  into  the  Ohio.  A  single  company  sends 
twelve  hundred  thousand  bushels  of  coal  down  the  Coal  river  annually.  The 
Elk  River  railroad  will  soon  connect  Charleston  with  Pittsburg  and  the  East, 
and  the  Parkersburg,  Ripley  and  Charleston  road  is  an  important  route  recently 
projected.  Manufactures  are  creeping  into  the  West  Virginia  capital.  It  begins 
to  assume  the  thrifty  and  active  appearance  of  a  New  England  city.  On  the 
banks  of  the  Kanawha  there  are  many  pleasant  towns,  rapidly  increasing  in 
population.  Prominent  among  them  are  Point  Pleasant,  Buffalo,  Raymond  City, 
Winfield,  St.  Albans,  Brownstown,  Coalburg  and  Cannelton. 


690 


THE      KANAWHA      SALT      REGION. 


The  completion  of  the  James  River  and  Kanawha  canal  would  undoubtedly  aid 
immensely  in  the  development  of  the  resources  of  the  Kanawha  valley.  The  canal 
is  now  completed  from  Richmond  to  Buchanan,  197  miles,  leaving  a  gap  of  303 


The  Snow  Hill  Salt  Works,  on  the  Kanawha  River. 

miles  yet  to  be  built  between  that  point  and  the  mouth  of  the  Kanawha.  The 
importance  to  Virginia  and  the  Western  States  of  a  line  of  cheap  water  trans- 
portation from  the  Ohio  river  to  the 
Chesapeake  bay  can  hardly  be  over- 
estimated. 

The  salt  region  tributary  to  Char- 
leston extends  from  that  place  fifteen 
miles-  on  either  side  up  the  Kanawha 
river.  The  annual  product  from  the 
wells  in  the  region  is  about  two  million 
bushels.  It  might  readily  be  increas- 
ed to  twenty.  The  Snow  Hill  furnace, 
owned  by  Dr.  Hale,  of  Charleston,  is 
one  of  the  largest  in  the  world,  and  in 
1870  produced  more  than  four  hun- 
dred thousand  bushels  of  excellent 
1 .,  m u,,,,     |iv,,,'-,„.i  salt#      This   important    interest    and 


*  At  the  Snow  Hill  works  the  brine  is  drawn  from  nine  wells,  each  from  eight  hundred 
to  one  thousand  feet  deep.  They  are  bored  through  about  three  hundred  feet  of  sandstone, 
below  which  the  brine  is  found.  From  forty-five  to  fifty  gallons  make  a  bushel  of  salt.  At- 
tached to  the  salt  works  is  a  bromine  factory,  where  a  hundred  pounds  of  this  odorous  drug 
are  daily  made.  The  coal  used  for  fuel  for  all  this  work  is  taken  from  a  five-foot  seam  on. 
the  adjacent  hills. 


STAPLE      AGRICULTURAL     PRODUCTS  —  MOUNDS. 


69I 


the  lumber  trade  will  in  a  few  years 
make  Charleston  a  large  city.  The 
Kanawha  river  and  its  tributaries 
drain  one  of  the  finest  bodies  of 
timbered  land  in  the  United  States. 
The  white  oak,  the  white  and  yellow 
poplar,  the  black  walnut,  the  shell 
bark  and  "  white  heart  hickory,"  grow 
to  enormous  heights ;  the  white  ash, 
the  locust,  the  linden,  the  birch,  the 
sycamore,  and  the  iron-wood  exhibit 
a  development  rarely  seen  in  the 
Northern  forests. 

The    agricultural    advantages   of 
the   country  surrounding  Charleston 
are  numerous.    Not  only  are  the  river 
bottom  lands  fertile,  but  the  mount- 
ain-sides   may   be    profitably    culti- 
|    vated.     Corn,  wheat,  rye,  oats,  and 
o    barley  are  profitable  ;  the  culture  of 
°    tobacco,  the  grape,  and  orchard  fruits, 
^    has  proved  very  successful.     There 
*    is    nowhere     a    better    country    for 
w>   sheep-raising,     and     the     English 
g    settlers    have  given  much    attention 
_    to  this  specialty. 
£  On  the  road  from  Charleston  to 

the  Ohio  river,  one  passes  through  a 
rich  and  extensive  timber  country. 
Between  Charleston  and  St.  Albans 
there  are  some  singular  conical- 
shaped  hills,  supposed  to  be  the 
work  of  that  lost  race  known  as  the 
"Mound  Builders."  Crossing  the 
Coal,  the  Scary,  the  Hurricane,  the 
Mud,  and  the  Guyandotte  rivers, 
the  Chesapeake  and  Ohio  railroad 
reaches  the  Ohio  river  at  Hunting- 
ton, a  new  and  pretty  town,  am- 
bitiously laid  out  as  a  "future  great 
city."  It  stands  at  the  head  of 
what  is  known  as  reliable  navigation 
on  the  Ohio;  steamers  of  light 
draught  can  reach  it  at  all  seasons, 
and    there    is    never  danger  of  any 


692 


HUNTINGTON     A     SUPPLY     POINT GUYANDOTTE, 


interruption  of  transportation.  Huntington  is  an  important  supply  point- for  the 
inhabitants  of  the  lower  Ohio  valley,  who,  before  the  building  of  the  route  from 
Richmond  through  the  mountains,  often  suffered  a  coal  famine  because  the  upper 
Ohio  was  obstructed.  From  Huntington  the  supply  will  be  constant  and  regu- 
lar. South  of  the  town  lie  deposits  of  splint  and  cannel  coal,  and  the  neighbor- 
ing counties  in  Kentucky  are  rich  in  both  coal  and  iron.  The  State  Normal 
School  of  West  Virginia,  formerly  Marshall  College,  one  of  the  elder  collegiate 
schools  of  the  Old  Dominion,  stands  within  the  "  city  limits."  The  Chesapeake 
and  Ohio  Company  have  also  established  their  construction  shops,  in  which  an 
army  of  operatives  work,  at  Huntington. 

Guyandotte  is  prettily  situated  on  the  river  of  the  same  name,  at  its  conflu- 
ence with  the  Ohio.  It  was  once  a  trading  place  of  much  importance,  and  still 
has  a  commerce  of  its  own  with  the  back-country.  The  farmers  and  lumbermen 
from  the  mountain  districts  come  down  the  river  in  barges,  which  they  propel 
with  long  poles ;  and  one  of  the  most  curious  sights  in  the  Southern  highlands 
is  a  group  of  these  rustic  watermen  storing  their  boats  with  provisions  purchased 
from  the  merchants  at  Guyandotte. 


The  result  of  climbing  a  sapling —  An  Artist  in  a  Fix. 


LXXVI. 


DOWN     THE     OHIO     RIVER— LOUISVILLE. 

rr^HE  French  explorers  called  the  Ohio  La  Belle  Riviere;  and  certainly,  when 
I  its  banks  are  full,  and  a  profusion  of  flowers  dot  the  cliffs  here  and  there 
overhanging  the  stream,  or  are  reflected  from  the  lowlands  in  the  shining  water, 
one  readily  recognizes  the  appropriateness  of  the  term.  But  the  Ohio  river,  on 
a  foggy  morning,  late  in  autumn,  when  sycamores  are  stripped  and  flowers 
are  gone,  hardly  recalls  the  affectionate  name  which  the  Frenchmen  bestowed 

UP°The  traveler,  journeying  from  Huntington  to  Louisville  on  the  Ohio,  finds  but 
little  in  natural  scenery  that  is  impressive;    much,  however,  that  is  very  beau- 


The  Levee  at  Louisville,  Kentucky. 

tiful.  In  summer,  when  the  shores  are  clothed  in  green  and  the  vineyards  are 
resplendent  with  foliage,  there  are  many  landscapes  which  charm  the  eye.  Inas- 
much as  the  channel  in  midsummer  contains  little  more  than  a  "light  dew,"  as 
the  Western  captains  call  it,  navigation  is  attended  with  peculiar  difficulties,  and 
steamboats  of  lightest  draught  are  often  detained  for  days  on  a  treacherous  bank 
suddenly  laid  bare.  > 

No  river  is  more  subject  to  extreme  elevations  and  depressions.  Ine 
average  range  between  high  and  low  water  is  said  to  be  more  than  thirty  feet. 
The  highest  stage  is  in  March,  and  the  lowest  in  August.  In  times  of  flood  the 
variations  are  so  rapid  that  the  river  at  Cincinnati  has  been  known  to  rise  at  the 


694  SCENERY     ALONG     THE      OHIO. 

rate  of  one  foot  per  hour  during  half  a  day.  It  requires  no  little  skill  and  sea- 
manship to  navigate  this  peculiar  stream.  Obstructions  were  originally  very 
numerous,  and  the  passages  between  the  exquisite  islands  and  the  sand-banks 
require  the  tact  and  courage  of  ocean  sailors.  The  days  of  keel-boat,  of  Ken- 
tucky float,  of  pirogue,  of  gondola,  skiff,  and  dug-out,  are  past.  Lines  of 
rail  have  superseded  the  noble  packets  which  sailed  from  Louisville  to  New 
Orleans,  and  much  of  the  romance  of  the  river  has  departed.  Yet  there  is 
a  certain  fascination  in  the  journey  by  night  along  the  great  current  which  slips, 
although  rapidly,  apparently  with  a  certain  laziness,  past  the  low  shores  sprinkled 
with  log  cabins. 

From  Huntington,  the  terminus  of  the  Chesapeake  and  Ohio  railroad,  in 
West  Virginia,  to  Cincinnati,  the  voyage  is  exceedingly  interesting.  The 
towns  on  the  Kentucky  shore,  while  few  of  them  are  large  or  bustling,  have  a 
solid  and  substantial  air.  Around  the  various  taverns  in  each  of  them  is 
grouped  the  regulation  number  of  tall,  gaunt  men,  with  hands  in  pockets,  and 
slouched  hats  drawn  over  their  eyes.  A  vagrant  pig  roots  here  and  there  in 
the  customary  sewer.  A  few  cavaliers  lightly  mount  the  rough  roads  leading 
into  the  unimposing  hills ;  a  few  negroes  slouch  sullenly  on  a  log  at  the  foot  of 
the  levee,  and  on  a  wharf-boat  half  a  hundred  white  and  black  urchins  stare, 
open-mouthed,  as  if  they  had  never  seen  steamboats  or  strangers  before. 

On  the  Ohio  side  of  the  river  there  are  large  manufacturing  towns,  evidences 
of  thrift,  industry  and  investment ;  iron-furnaces  smoke ;  and  the  clatter  of  ham- 
mers and  the  roll  of  wheels  are  heard. 

The  distance  from  Pittsburg,  in  Pennsylvania,  to  Cairo,  in  Illinois,  where  the 
Ohio  pours  its  muddy  flood  into  the  muddier  waters  of  the  Mississippi,  is  967 
miles.  The  tourist  who  takes  a  packet  from  Wheeling,  in  West  Virginia,  to 
Parkersburg,  will  see  some  noble  scenery ;  for  the  upper  Ohio,  when  navigation 
is  practicable  there,  far  surpasses  in  beauty  the  lower  portion  of  the  stream. 
Descending  from  Parkersburg  he  will  pass  Pomeroy,  Gallipolis,  Catlettsburg, 
Ironton,  Portsmouth,  Maysville,  Ripley,  and  Cincinnati,  and  will  note  on  the 
banks  many  salt,  nail,  and  iron  manufactories.  From  Cincinnati  he  can  have 
his  choice  of  two  or  three  steamers  daily  for  Louisville,  and  from  the  Ken- 
tucky metropolis  can  drift  on  to  Evansville,  in  Indiana,  and  thence  to  Cairo. 
At  Maysville,  in  Kentucky,  between  Huntington  and  Cincinnati,  there  are  two 
extensive  cotton  factories  and  several  iron  foundries.  The  town  contains  many 
handsome  streets,  and  is  the  entry  port  for  the  north-eastern  section  of  the  State. 
It  is  also  the  most  extensive  hemp  market  in  the  whole  country. 

Between  Cincinnati  and  Louisville  there  are  but  few  towns  of  importance  on 
the  Kentucky  shore  of  the  Ohio.  At  Big  Bone  Lick,  in  Boone  county,  great 
numbers  of  bones  of  the  mastodon  and  the  Arctic  elephant  were  once  found. 
At  Warsaw,  a  few  miles  below,  there  are  many  tobacco  factories.  Carroll- 
ton,  formerly  called  Fort  William,  stands  at  the  junction  of  that  beautiful  stream, 
the  Kentucky,  with  the  Ohio. 

The  scenery  along  the  Kentucky  river  justly  ranks  among  the  wildest  and 
most  picturesque  in  the  United  States.     For  more  than  200  miles,  as  the  stream 


IMPROVEMENT     OF     THE      OHIO      RIVER. 


695 


flows  north-west  to  empty  into  the  Ohio,  it  passes  through  massive  limestone 
ledges,  arranged  upon  either  side  of  its  narrow  channel  in  great  cliffs,  forming 
irregular  canons,  or  pours  over  rapids,  or  glides  between  precipices  500  feet  high, 
whose  tops  almost  touch,  like  roofs  in  the  streets  of  an  old  Italian  town. 

The  river  flows  through  Middle  Kentucky  for  the  greater  portion  of  its  course. 
The  confluence  of  the  small  streams  which  make  it  is  at  the  spot  known  as  the 
"  Three  Forks,"  in  Lee  county,  the  very  heart  of  the  coal  and  iron  region 
which  stretches  away  for  miles  in  every  direction.  During  the  winter  and 
spring  coal   and    pig-iron    are    floated    down    the    river    in    barges. 


A  familiar  scene  in  a  Louisville  Street. 

The  improvement  of  the  Ohio  river  and  its  tributaries  is  highly  necessary.  It 
is  demanded  by  more  than  one-fifth  of  the  States,  and  one-third  of  the  whole 
population  of  the  country,  and  inasmuch  as  that  population  has  hitherto  paid 
thirty-five  per  cent,  of  the  internal  taxation  of  the  Union,  and  as  it  raises  forty 
per  cent,  of  the  farm  products  of  the  land,  owns  forty  per  cent,  of  the  farm-lands 
and  of  the  live  stock,  and  thirty-six  per  cent  of  the  capital  in  farming  implements 
and  machinery,  it  would  seem  that  it  has  a  right  to  ask  of  the  Government  this 
boon.  The  sum  demanded  for  the  work  will  depend  largely  upon  the  plan 
adopted  for  its  accomplishment.     The  estimates  of  engineers  have  varied  from 


696 


LOUISVILLE,      KENTUCKY, 


seventeen  to  sixty  millions.  No  definite  decision  as  to  the  wisest  plan  has  yet 
been  reached.  Those  most  directly  interested  are  still  in  doubt  whether  to  de- 
cide upon  supplying  the  required  volume  of  water  by  aid  of  reservoirs,  or  main- 
taining the  proper  navigation  by  low  dams  with  open  chutes,  or  slack-watering 
the  entire  stream. 

The  commerce  of  the  river  is  immense.  The  amount  of  coal  transported 
from  Pittsburg  down  the  Ohio  increased  from  fifty  million  bushels  in  1869  to 
ninety  millions  in  1872,  or  more  than  twenty-six  per  cent,  per  annum.  The  ton- 
nage of  the  port  of  Pittsburg  in  1869  was  estimated  at  eight  hundred  thousand 
tons;  in  1872  it  was  one  million  six  hundred  and  sixty-nine  thousand  tons.  The 
commerce  along  the  stream  amounts  to  nearly  nine  hundred  millions  of  dollars 
yearly.  The  Ohio  drains  an  area  of  214,000  square  miles,  and  could  furnish 
cheap  transportation  for  the  commerce  of  fifty  millions  of  people. 

Louisville,  the  chief  city  of  the  goodly  commonwealth  of  Kentucky,  lies  on 
the  southern  bank  of  the  Ohio  river,  at  a  point  where  the  navigation  of  the 
stream  was  originally  obstructed  by  rapids.  For  six  miles  above  the  site  of  the 
city,  the  stream  stretches  out  into  a  smooth  sheet  of  water,  a  mile  wide,  and  em- 
braces within  its  limits  the  mouth  of  Bear  Grass  creek,  which  affords  a  safe  har- 
bor for  the  myriad  barges  and  flat-boats  which  drift  on  the  bosom  of  the  great 
stream.  Situated  centrally  between  the  cotton-fields  of  the  South  and  the  grain- 
fields  of  the  West,  amply  supplied  with  rail- 
ways piercing  both  West  and  South  in  all 
directions,  and  with  ten  miles  of  river-front 
from  twenty  to  twenty-five  feet  above  highest 
flood  mark,  the  city  has  a  promising  commer- 
cial future.  Its  levees,  while  they  are  not  so 
picturesque,  and  the  life  along  them  is  not  so 
vivacious  as  that  which  one  sees  at  New  Or- 
leans, Savannah,  and  Charleston,  are  yet  quite 
as  fine  as  those  of  any  Southern  or  Western 
city.  What  Louisville  has  lost  in  river  trade, 
since  railroads  came  in,  she  has  gained  in  rail- 
way commerce.  The  days  of  tedious  steam- 
ing from  Louisville  to  the  Louisiana  lowlands, 
in  roundabout  ways  and  along  treacherous 
currents,  are  gone,  and  have  pulled  down  with 
them  into  oblivion  many  noble  fortunes ;  but 
the  city  grows  and  prospers  despite  the  mis- 
fortunes that  have  overtaken  the  commerce 
once  its  mainstay.  Opposite  Louisville,  on 
the  Indiana  shore,  are  the  towns  of  JefFerson- 
ville  and  New  Albany ;  the  former  pretty  and  dull,  the  latter  a  kind  of  Western 
Brooklyn,  having  ready  communication  with  Louisville  by  means  of  the  great 
railroad  bridge,  a  triumph  of  mechanical  engineering,  which  has  long  spanned 
the  stream. 


A  Waiter  at  the  Gait  House,  Louisville,  Kentucky. 


ITS      INSTITUTIONS. 


697 


West  and  south  of  the  city  the  lots  are  lovely,  and  admit  of  unlimited 
extension ;  and  on  the  broad  and  shapely  streets  which  are  one  of  its  peculiar 
features  stand  many  handsome  mansions,  each  one  of  which  is  set  down  in 
a  capacious  yard,  well  kept,  and  now  and  then  embellished  with  terraces.  The 
streets  which  run  parallel  with  the  river,  and  not  far  from  the  levee,  are  long,  and 
flanked  with  solid  business  blocks,  very  uniform  in  architecture,  and  as  devoid  of 
pretense  and  show  as  is  the  character  of  the  men  who  built  them.  Main,  Market, 
Jefferson  and  Green  streets  are  all  filled  with  large  and  handsome  shops  and 
warehouses,  and  many  of  those  which  cross  them  at  right  angles,  extending  in- 
definitely into  the  vast  plains,  are  devoted  to  residences. 


Scene  in  the  Louisville  Exposition. 

Louisville  is  famous  for  several  excellent  institutions,  noteworthy  among 
which  are  the  "Gait  House,"  a  massive  stone  structure  in  the  English  style,  long 
celebrated  by  foreign  travelers  as  the  best  hotel  in  the  United  States;  the 
Louisville  Courier  -Journal,  the  successor  to  the  old  Journal,  on  which  Prentice 
expended  his  wit,  and  upon  which  those  who  were  wounded  by  his  shafts  vented 
their  spleen ;  and  the  "  Public  Library,"  the  outgrowth  of  an  ingenious  lottery 
scheme  conducted  by  an  ex- Governor  of  the  State,  and  now  a  thriving  insti- 
tution with  museums  and  lecture-rooms  attached.  The  Courier -Journal,  edited 
to-day  by  the  sprightly  Watterson,  whose  courageous  attitude  in  reproving 
many  of  the    prime   faults  in  Kentucky   politics    and    civilization,    and    whose 


698  ITS      ORIGIN     AND      GROWTH CHRISTOPHER     GRAHAM. 

trenchant  style  in  his    editorials,    have   rendered   him   famous,   has  long  had  a 
sensible  influence  on  the  political  and  social  life  of  the  State. 

The  Commercial,  a  Republican  newspaper,  has  grown  and  prospered,  as  its 
party  grows  in  Louisville,  steadily  and  surely. 

The  City  of  Louisville  was  surveyed  as  early  as  1770,  when  parties  came 
from  Fort  Pitt,  now  known  as  Pittsburg,  and  examined  the  land  adjacent  to  the 
Falls  of  the  Ohio,  with  a  view  to  parceling  it  as  "bounty  territory."  In  1773, 
Captain  Thomas  Bullitt,  the  deputy  of  a  special  commission  from  William  and 
Mary  College  in  Virginia,  moored  his  bark  in  Grass  harbor,  and  with  his  little 
band  of  hunters  made  numerous  surveys.  Death,  however,  interrupted  his 
labors,  which  were  largely  instrumental  in  the  definite  settlement  of  Kentucky. 
In  1778,  Colonel  George  Rogers  Clarke,  who  had  for  some  time  fought  the 
British  along  the  Ohio,  took  possession  of  and  fortified  Corn  Island,  opposite  the 
spot  now  occupied  by  Louisville.  In  1779,  Louisville  was  permanently  estab- 
lished ;  cabins,  block-houses  and  stockades  were  erected.  Clarke  and  his 
hunters  lived  in  constant  danger,  and  battled  with  the  Indians  for  many  a  long 
day.  In  succeeding  years,  Louisville  grew  up  a  scraggy,  rude  town,  whose 
streets  were  here  and  there  intersected  with  ponds  of  stagnant  water  ;*  and  so 
unhealthy  was  the  location  considered  that  it  was  known  as  the  "  grave-yard  of 
the  Ohio."  If  the  denizens  of  the  Louisville  of  the  past  could  visit  the  thriving 
and  healthy  Louisville  of  to-day,  with  its  miles  of  elegant  streets,  its  smooth 
pavements,  its  fine  hospitals  and  churches,  its  mammoth  hotels  and  pretty 
theatres,  its  bustling  "Exposition,"  and  its  brilliant  society,  they  would  hardly 
believe  the  evidence  of  their  senses. 

Life  in  this  pleasant  metropolis  of  130,000  inhabitants  is  socially  very  attrac- 
tive. Nowhere  in  the  country  is  frankness  and  freedom  of  manner  so  thoroughly 
commingled  with  so  much  of  high-bred  courtesy.  The  people  of  Kentucky 
really,  as  Tuckerman  says,  illustrate  one  of  the  highest  phases  of  Western  charac- 
ter. They  spring  from  a  hardy  race  of  hunters  and  self-reliant  men,  accustomed 
to  the  chase  and  to  long  and  perilous  exertion.  The  men  of  Kentucky,  while 
they  are  not  afflicted  with  any  peculiar  idiosyncrasies,  are  intensely  individual. 
There  is  something  inspiring  in  the  figure  of  a  grand  old  patriarch  like  Christo- 
pher Graham,  now  in  his  ninety-second  year,  erect,  vigorous,  and  alert  as  an 
Englishman  at  sixty.  Born  in  the  wild  woods  of  Kentucky  five  years  before  it 
became  a  State,  he  has  lived  to  see  a  mighty  change  pass  over  the  commonwealth 
where  he  cast  his  fortunes;  and  he  delights  to  tell  of  the  days  when  men  went, 
rifle  in  hand,  about  their  daily  work,  and  when  the  State  was  constantly  troubled 
with  Indian  incursions.  Mr.  Graham  was  long  noted  as  the  best  marksman,  with 
a  rifle,  in  America,  and  has  had,  in  his  eventful  life,  a  hundred  adventures  with 
Indian,  guerilla,  and  bandit.  The  product  of  a  rough,  and,  in  some  respects,  bar- 
barous time,  when  shooting,  swimming,  leaping,  wrestling,  and  killing  Indians 
were  the  only  exercises  considered  manly,  he  is  to-day  a  gentle  old  man,  busied 
with  works  of  charity,  and  with  the  upbuilding  of  a  fine  museum  of  mineralogy 
in  Louisville. 

*  See  "  Casseday's  History  of  Louisville." 


LXXVII. 


A   , VISIT     TO     THE     MAMMOTH     CAVE. 


THE  country  along  the  line  of  rail  from  Nashville,  in  Tennessee,  to  Cave 
City,  in  Kentucky,  whence  travelers  depart  in  rickety  stages  over  the 
rough  routes  for  the  Mammoth  Cave,  is  especially  rich  in  fine  farms.  In  autumn, 
when  golden  sunlight  lingers  lovingly  over  the  great  arched  trees,  and  makes 


Mammoth  Cave,  Kentucky — The  Boat   Ride  on  Echo  River. 

checker-work  upon  the  reddish  soil,  a  ride  through  this  highly- cultivated  country 
is  thoroughly  charming.  The  people  one  meets  are  mainly  rough  country 
farmers,  plodding  sturdily  to  court  on  fine  horses,  or  journeying  from  farm  to 
farm. 

At  Glasgow  Junction  and  Cave  City,  on  the  Louisville  and  Nashville  railroad, 
primitive  hotels  receive  the  visitor,  and  rival  stage-drivers  fill  his  ear  with  alarm- 
ing rumors  of  each  other's  incapacity.     At  Cave  City  a  sleepy  waiter  drowsily 
45 


700 


OUR     APPROACH     TO     THE     CAVE, 


gives  inexact  information,  and  negroes,  with  persistent  demand  for  backshish, 
follow  the  unfortunate  Northerner  and  clutch  his  carpet-bag,  despite  his  efforts 
to  retain  it. 

Edmondson  county,  in  which  the  Mammoth  Cave  is  situated,  is  rich  in  natu- 
ral curiosities.  On  Dismal  creek,  a  perpendicular  rock,  163  feet  high,  towers 
like  a  black  spectre  against  the  crystal  vault  of  the  sky,  and  the  inhabitants  invest 
it  with  many  strange  and  highly  apocryphal  legends.  Near  the  town  of  Browns- 
ville is  a  large  cave  containing  a  petrified  tree,  and  on  Indian  Hill  are  the  remains 
of  a  fortification,  with  mounds  and  burial-places  scattered  over  the  acres  in  the 
vicinity. 


The  Entrance  to  Mammoth  Cave  (Looking  Out). 

The  visit  to  the  Mammoth  Cave,  which  we  made  with  a  merry  party,  was 
in  autumn,  when  the  sunlight,  tempered  by  fresh  breezes,  seemed  to  permeate 
every  nook  and  cranny  of  the  forests  through  which  the  road  wound  over  hill  and 
across  plain.  The  vehicle  in  which  we  embarked  at  Glasgow  was  rickety  and 
venerable,  as  also  was  the  horse  which  drew  it;  and  the  driver  beguiled  the 
way  with  stories  not  calculated  to  impress  us  favorably  with  the  hotel  near  the 
cave.  Indeed,  so  great  was  his  animosity  toward  the  proprietors  of  that  hotel, 
that  he  refused  to  set  us  down  within  the  high  fence  which  inclosed  the  building, 
and  indulged  in  a  lively  passage-at-words,  calculated  to  awaken  quarrelsome 
feelings  with  the  host  when  he  came  up  to  welcome  us. 

The  hotel  is  a  huge,  rambling  structure,  built  in  Southern  style,  with  long 
porches  and  surrounded  by  a  pleasant  lawn  dotted  with  noble  trees.     Passing  the 


ENTRANCE CHEERY     PSALM      SINGING.  701 

primitive  counter,  on  which  lay  the  "  Mammoth  Cave  Register,"  and  paying  the 
fees  exacted  from  every  visitor,  we  donned  overalls,  blouses,  and  flannel  caps,  and 
found  ourselves  face  to  face  with  an  amiable  darkey,  who,  taking  up  two  swing- 
ing lamps,  led  the  way  down  a  rocky  descent  toward  a  black  opening  from  which 
came  a  rush  of  cold  air.  Over  the  yawning  mouth  of  the  cave  a  stream  of  water 
was  pouring,  and  around  the  sharp  rocks  on  the  brow  of  the  hill  were  graceful 
fringes  of  mosses  and  leaves,  and  festoons  of  ferns.  Shadows  fell  gloomily  against 
the  sunlight  as  we  hastened  down  the  declivity,  and  a  wandering  bat,  giving  a 
faint  scream,  flew  directly  in  my  face,  and  then  darted  back  into  the  darkness. 

A  tree,  apparently  growing  out  of  the  solid  rock,  stretches  its  trunk  over  the 
chasm.  This  trunk  is  moss- grown,  #and  both  the  moss  and  the  leaves  upon  it  have 
a  pale  yellowish  tinge.  Descending  a  few  steps,  and  suddenly  losing  the  genial 
warmth  of  the  sun,  we  were  forced  to  stoop,  and  to  plunge  forward,  almost  upon 
all  fours,  into  the  stony  recesses. 

Our  dusky  guide  now  supplied  us  each  with  a  swinging  lamp,  by  whose  dim 
light  we  soon  became  accustomed  to  the  narrow  pathway,  everywhere  singularly 
free  from  obstacles.  The  cool  air  was  so  exhilarating,  that  after  a  march  of 
several  miles,  clambering  over  stones,  filing  carefully  along  the  edge  of  abysses, 
and  escalading  innumerable  cliffs,  we  scarcely  felt  fatigue. 

Unlocking  a  rude  iron  gate,  the  guide  ushered  us  into  a  second  narrow  corri- 
dor, from  the  roof  of  which,  as  the  light  penetrated  the  gloom,  hundreds  of  bats 
flitted  down  and  circled  about  our  heads,  screaming,  as  if  resentful  of  the  intru- 
sion. On  the  return  journey  the  bats  usually  make  the  promenade  through  this 
gallery  quite  exciting,  and  many  a  timid  lady  remembers  with  horror  the  gaunt- 
let she  there  ran. 

We  wandered  on  for  several  hours,  the  cheery  guide  singing  psalms  in  a 
round  musical  voice,  and  turning  from  time  to  time  to  caution  us  against  ventur- 
ing into  unexplored  by-ways  where  pitfalls  were  numerous.  Now  we  plodded 
through  a  mighty  gallery,  whose  walls  and  ceilings  seemed  frescoed  by  the  hands 
of  man  rather  than  incrusted  with  stalactite  formations ;  now  climbed  miniature 
mountains ;  now  looked  down  "hundreds  of  feet  into  deep  wells.  Each  of  the 
galleries  and  recesses  has  been  christened,  but  the  visitor  sometimes  finds  it 
difficult  to  detect  in  the  fantastic  forms  of  rock  the  resemblance  suggested  by  the 
names.  We  visited  the  Rotunda,  a  vast  chamber  which  seemed  like  the 
council- room  of  some  ancient  castle.  Then,  after  exploring  many  antechambers 
and  halls,  we  entered  Audubon  avenue.  After  wandering  in  that  mighty  gallery, 
whose  roof  is  sixty  feet  above  its  smooth  floor,  we  returned  to  the  passage 
through  which  we  had  entered,  passing  into  the  main  cave,  and  visiting,  in 
rapid  succession,  the  "  Church,"  the  ruins  of  some  old  saltpetre  works,  the 
Kentucky  Cliffs,  the  Gothic  Gallery,  the  Gothic  Arcade  and  Chapel,  the  Reg- 
ister Hall,  the  Altar,  Vulcan's  Forge,  and,  finally,  the  Devil's  Arm- Chair,  a  huge 
stalactite,  beautiful  in  color,  in  which  we  enthroned  one  of  the  ladies  accom- 
panying the  party.  The  Gothic  Chapel,  through  which  we  wandered  half- 
convinced  that  we  were  dreaming,  is  rich  in  noble  ornaments,  its  columns 
rivaling  in  the  nicety  of  their  proportions  those  of  the  finest  cathedrals.     The 


702 


THE   GOTHIC  AVENUE THE   BALL-ROOM. 


■<:  7  V 


Gothic  avenue,  reached  by  a  detour  from  the  main  cave  and  an  ascent  of  some 
thirty  feet,  is  two  miles  in  length,  and  a  promenade  along  it  discloses  an 
uninterrupted  panorama  of  natural  wonders  which  seem  the  work  of  giant  archi- 
tects rather  than  the  result  of  one  of  nature's  convulsions.     All  the  stalactites 

and  stalagmites  in  the  cave  are  ex- 
tremely rich  in  color,  and  look  as  if 
they  had  been. carefully  polished.  The 
ceiling  of  the  "Gothic  Avenue"  is  as 
smooth  as  that  of  any  mansion. 
Passing  the  "Devil's  Arm- Chair," 
and  stopping  for  a  moment  to  inspect 
the"  Elephant's  Trunk"  and  the 
"  Pillars  of  Hercules,"  we  came  at  last 
to  the  "Lover's  Leap,"  a  large  pointed 
rock  more  than  ninety  feet  above  the 
roadway,  and  projecting  into  an  im- 
mense rotunda. 

The  "Ball -Room"  is  a  mighty 
chamber,  admirably  fitted  for  the 
dance,  with  a  rocky  gallery  even,  in 
which  from  time  to  time  an  orchestra 
has  been  placed  when  gay  parties  from 
Louisville  an,d  other  neighboring  cities 
have  engaged  in  festivities,  with  music 
and  torches.  A  short  distance  beyond 
looms  up  a  huge  mass  of  rock,  known 
as  the  Giant's  Coffin.  Passing  the  de- 
serted chamber,  the  "  Wooden  Bowl  Cave,"  where  oxide  of  iron  and  lime  are 
sprinkled  on  the  floor,  and  crossing  the  "  Bridge  of  Sighs,"  we  came  to  the 
"  Star  Chamber,"  where  our  guide  had  prepared  for  us  a  genuine  surprise. 
Mysteriously  commanding  us  to  be  seated  in  a  dark  corner,  and  saying  that  he 
would  return  to  find  us  on  the  morrow,  he  suddenly  seized  the  lights  and  with- 
drew. We  heard  his  sonorous  voice  echoing  along  the  galleries  as  he  hurried 
back  over  the  pathway,  and  while  we  were  yet  wondering  what  was  the  object 
of  this  sudden  manoeuvre,  we  saw  above  us  twinkling  stars,  and  seemed  to  catch 
a  glimpse  of  the  blue  sky  from  which  we  had  thought  ourselves  shut  out  by  the 
solid  rock.  Indeed,  so  strange  was  the  illusion,  that  we  fancied  we  could  feel  the 
fresh  air  blowing  upon  us,  and,  for  a  few  moments,  imagined  that  the  guide 
had  conveyed  us  by  some  roundabout  way  to  the  mouth  of  the  cave,  and  then 
had  hastily  left  us,  that  he  might  enjoy  our  surprise.  But  presently  we  heard 
his  voice,  confessing  the  cheat.  The  dark  ceiling  of  the  Star  Chamber  is 
covered  with  a  myriad  incrustations,  sparkling  like  stars;  and  the  artful  guide, 
by  a  careful  arrangement  of  his  lamps  and  the  use  of  Bengal  lights,  had  pro- 
duced a  magical  effect.  The  ceiling,  which  was  not  more  than  forty  feet  from 
our  heads,  had  seemed    remote  as    the  heavens.       It  was   like  the  very  early 


Mammoth  Cave 


the  Devil's  Arm- Chair.' 


wright's    rotunda — the    fat    man's    misery. 


703 


dawn,  when  the  stars  are  gradually  fading  and  seem  no  longer  to  belong  in 
the  sky.  The  guide,  in  the  distance,  imitated  to  perfection  the  crowing  of  the 
morning  cock,  and  then  burst  into  loud  laughter  as,  removing  the  lamps,  he 
exposed  the  trick,  and  returned  to  us. 

From  the  Star  Chamber  we  descended  to  "Wright's  Rotunda,"  which  has  a 
ceiling  of  four  hundred  feet  span  without  a  single  pillar  to  uphold  it,  and 
wandered  on  through  the  Black  Chambers,  where  masses  of  shelving  stone 
reminded  us  of  old  baronial  castle  walls  and  towers  ;  and  ascending  thence  into 
an  upper  room,  in  which  we  caught  the  whispers  of  a  far-away  waterfall,  trans- 
lated, upon  our  crossing  the  room,  into  the  roar  of  a  cataract  falling  sullenly 
down  deep  and  hidden  recesses.  Next,  crawling  upon  our  hands  and  knees 
under  a  low  arch,  we  entered  the  Fairy  Grotto,  whence  we  retraced  our  steps 
to  the  entrance  of  the  cave.  The  bats  gave  us  a  lively  reception  as  we  passed 
through  the  gate  around  which  they  flitted  as  sentinels,  and  it  was  not  until 
after  we  had  climbed  the  hill,  and  stood  in  the  hotel  garden  for  some  time, 
that  we  missed  the  sun,  so  accustomed  had  we  become  to  the  darkness  during 
our  long  sojourn  in  the  cave. 

Early  next  morning  we  were  once  more  treading  the  corridors,  and  by 
nightfall  had  made  a  journey  of  eighteen  miles.  The  experiences  of  this  sec- 
ond day  were  far  more  novel  and  interesting  than  those  of  the  first. 

The  various  passages  of  the  cave 
have  a  total  of  more  than  two  hun- 
dred miles  in  length,  and  many  of 
those  not  often  seen  are  said  to  sur- 
pass in  beauty  those  commonly  visited. 
To  my  thinking,  nothing,  however,  in 
subterranean  scenery  can  be  finer  than 
the  mighty  and  ragged  pass  of  El 
Ghor,  whose  jagged  peaks,  frightful 
ravines,  and  long  recesses,  filled  with 
incrusted  rocks,  on  which  the  swing- 
ing lamps  threw  a  changeful  shimmer, 
extend  for  long  distances.  On  this 
day  we  also  made  the  acquaintance 
of  the  "Fat  Man's  Misery,"  which 
the  artist  has  faithfully  depicted,  and 
through  which  some  of  our  party 
found  no  little  difficulty  in  pressing. 

Crossing  the  black  and  deep  river 
Styx  by  a  natural  bridge,  and  safely 
ferrying  over  Lake  Lethe,  we  passed 
through  a  level  and  lofty  hall  called  the  "  Great  Walk,"  and  soon  arrived  at 
"  Echo  River,"  on  whose  moist  and  muddy  shore  a  rude  barge  was  drawn  up. 
The  stream  seemed  shut  in  by  a  huge  overreaching  wall  of  solid  stone,  and  we 
turned  in  amazement  to  the  ebony  guide,  who  motioned  us  to  take  seats  in  the 


The  Mammoth  Cave — "The  Fat  Man's  Misery." 


7°4 


A     DARK     VOYAGE STEPHEN. 


boat,  jumping  in  when  we  had  obeyed,  and  rowing  boldly  forward  into  the 
blackness.  From  time  to  time  the  wall  seemed  to  press  down  upon  us, 
and  we  were  obliged  to  bend  close  to  the  seats.  The  guide  sang  loudly  as 
we  floated  through  the  darkness,  our  little  lights  making  but  tiny  specks  in 
the  gloom.  The  sense  of  isolation  from  the  world  was  here  complete.  We 
seemed  at  last  to  have  had  a  glimpse  of  the  infernal  regions,  and  imagined  our- 
selves departed  souls,  doomed  to  a 
reluctant  ride  in  Charon's  bark.  A 
deep  silence  fell  upon  all  the  visitors ; 
but  the  guide  still  sang  loudly  his 
pious  psalms,  only  ceasing  them  to 
burst  into  laughter  when  the  ladies 
cowered  as  we  rounded  some  rocky 
corner,  and  -seemed  about  to  be 
crushed  against  a  lowering  wall. 

After  half  an  hour  of  this  mys- 
terious journeying  we  approached 
another  shore,  and  left  behind  us  the 
archway.  Before  us  lay  a  vast  region 
of  black  and  desolate  pathways  over 
high  rocks  and  under  huge  boulders, 
along  avenues  brilliant  with  stalactites 
and  resplendent  with  sparkling  ceil- 
ings. Here  we  were  recalled  to  a 
knowledge  of  the  outer  world  by 
encountering  a  return  party,  escorted 
by  Stephen,  one  of  the  first  guides 
who  ever  penetrated  the  cave,  and 
concerning  whom  a  curious  story  is 
told. 

Stephen  had  for  many  years  urged 
a  white  man  living  near  the  cave  to 
build  a  boat  with  which  to  explore 
the  Echo  river.  When  at  last  it  was 
built,  and  a  voyage  under  the  arches 
was  decided  upon,  he  (Stephen)  was 
afraid  to  undertake  it,  but  was  com- 
pelled at  the  pistol's  mouth  to  enter 
the  boat  and  proceed.  Neither  he 
nor  the  white  man  entered  upon 
this  daring  feat  without  fear  and  trembling,  for  no  one  could  have  predicted 
that  the  stream  would  find  its  outlet  beyond  the  cave,  in  Green  river.  Echo 
river  is  certainly  one  of  the  most  remarkable  streams  in  the  world.  It  is  here 
and  there  wide  and  deep  enough  to  float  a  steamer  of  the  largest  class.  A  few 
fish  are  now  and  then  caught  in  it.     They  have  no  eyes,  and  certainly  need  none. 


Mammoth  Cave — "The  Subterranean  Album. 


BLUE      LIGHTS PITS VANDALISM.  7®$' 

The  journey  from  this  stream  through  the  pass  of  El  Ghor,  Silliman's 
Avenue,  and  Wellington's  Gallery,  all  the  tatter  leading  up  to  St.  Mary's  Vine- 
yard and  the  Hill  of  the  Holy  Sepulchre,  was  fatiguing ;  and  when  we  returned 
at  nightfall  we  found  that  the  day's  journey  had  quite  demolished  our  stout  walk- 
ing shoes. 

The  burning  of  blue  lights  in  various  places  where  the  ceilings  are  covered 
with  sulphate  of  iron  produces  marvelous  effects.  No  palaces,  no  castles, 
ancient  or  modern,  rival  in  beauty  or  in  grandeur  the  corridors  and  passages  of 
the  Mammoth  Cave.  In  one  of  the  long  avenues  we  saw  the  Veiled  Statue,  a 
perpendicular  rock  which,  from  a  distance,  as  one  turns  around  the  angle  of  the 
way,  looks  exactly  like  the  figure  of  some  ancient  goddess  clad  in  draperies. 
Many  of  the  incrustations  or  "  formations,"  as  our  guide  called  them,  are  in  the 
form  of  rosaces,  some  rivaling  the  most  beautiful  bits  of  Gothic  architectural 
decoration.  The  shading  is  bold  and  beautiful,  and  the  lines  and  curves  delicious. 
The  pillars  seem  to  flit  away  like  ghosts  as  one  comes  suddenly  upon  them  in 
the  dim  light  given  by  the  lamps.  Occasionally  one  reaches  a  place  where  the 
cave  seems  to  afford  no  outlet  into  passages  beyond ;  but  the  guide  turns  sud- 
denly to  right  or  left  through  narrow  archways,  or  down  little  steps  to  new 
wonders.  The  journey  is  a  succession  of  surprises.  One  of  the  most  curious 
experiences  is  a  look  into  the  "Bottomless  Pit,"  which  is  reached  from  the  "De- 
serted Chambers ;"  and  a  glance  at  the  Dead  Sea,  into  which  one  may  shudder- 
ingly  peer  from  a  precipice  eighty  feet  high,  is  not  without  its  fascination.  A 
young  telegraph  operator  from  Michigan  once  descended  into  a  hitherto  unex- 
plored pit  in  the  cave,  and  found  bottom  198  feet  down.  He  narrowly  escaped 
death,  however,  for  the  rope  with  which  he  was  lowered  was  cut  nearly  in  two 
by  the  sharp  rocks  in  which  it  caught.  The  best  features  of  the  cave  are  the 
Dome,  the  Bottomless  Pit,  and  the  Pass  of  El  Ghor.  Their  grandeur  and  beauty 
amply  repay  the  journey  of  thousands  of  miles  which  European  and  American 
tourists  make  to  see  them. 

Vandalism  has  made  its  way  into  the  Mammoth  Cave.  The  lamps  given 
visitors  are  sometimes  attached  to  a  rod,  by  means  of  which  industrious  snobs 
smoke  the  letters  of  their  names  upon  the  sides  and  roofs  of  some  of  the  corridors. 
Thousands  of  people  have  thus  testified  their  thirst  for  notoriety,  and  many  a 
shock  is  given  the  impressible  traveler  by  finding  the  name  and  date  of  some 
obscure  mortal  recorded  on  a  rock  which  he  had  fancied  heretofore  unseen  by  men. 

The  cave  is  said  to  have  been  first  discovered  in  1802  by  a  hunter,  who 
strayed  into  it  in  pursuit  of  an  animal  that  had  taken  refuge  there.  It  now 
belongs  to  nine  heirs,  who  each  receive  about  $1,000  yearly  income  from  it. 
Were  the  facilities  for  reaching  it  better,  the  heirs  might  readily  receive  $50,000 
annually  for  an  indefinite  period. 

The  cave  has  repeatedly  been  offered  for  sale  for  half  a  million  dollars,  and 
Louisville  capitalists  have  talked  from  time  to  time  of  forming  a  company  for  its 
purchase,  and  erecting  a  new  and  splendid  hotel  in  its  immediate  vicinity. 

Gathered  about  the  great  fire-place  of  the  hotel  office  in  the  evening,  the  con- 
versation drifted  to  Kentucky  politics,  and  one  of  the  Englishmen  who  had  been 


yo6 


THE      KU-KLUX. 


exploring  the  cave  with  us  inquired  curiously  about  the  Ku-Klux.  The  Ken- 
tuckian  in  charge  of  the  hotel  answered  that  the  Ku-Klux  in  that  section  were 
called  Regulators,  and  they  never  troubled  any  except  bad  people.  "They  are 
composed,"  he  said,  "of  the  gentlemen  in  the  neighborhood,  and  when  those 
gentlemen  are  annoyed  by  vicious  neighbors  they  warn  them  to  move  away. 
If  they  will  not  move,  they  move  them,  and  if  they  resist  they  force  them." 
This  he  asserted  was  only  done  in  cases  when  great  provocation  had  been  re- 
ceived, and  he  insisted  that  politics  had  little  to  do  with  the  operations  of  the 
Klan.  Carelessly  dropping  his  reserve,  the  Kentuckian  added  :  "  We  don't  do 
anything  wrong;  we  simply  correct  those  who  don't  behave  right,"  thus  uncon- 
sciously intimating  that  he  himself  was  one  of  the  Knights  of  the  "Invisible 
Empire." 


A  Country  Blacksmith  Shop. 


LXXVIII. 


THE     TRADE     OF     LOUISVILLE. 


THE  trade  of  Louisville,  long  dwarfed  by  the  oppressive  slave  system  to 
which  Kentucky  was  utterly  devoted,  and  which  prevented  the  growth 
of  large  manufacturing  towns,  is  gradually  springing  into  vigorous  life.  Louis- 
ville has  long  been  one  of  the  most  important  tobacco  markets  in  the  United 
States.  Situated  near  the  centre  of  the  largest  tobacco- growing  district  of  the 
country,  with  an  admirable  system  of  railroad  connections  North  and  South, 
and  a  noble  water  outlet,  she  has  superior  facilities  for  this  branch  of  trade.  The 
bulk  of  the  staple  raised  in  Ken- 
tucky, the  chief  tobacco  -  growing 
State  of  the  Union,  is  sold  in  the 
Louisville  market.  The  Kentucky 
crop  for  1 87 1  amounted  to  66,000 
hogsheads,  of  which  nearly  50,000 
were  sold  in  Louisville.  Buyers  for 
American  and  foreign  markets  reside 
permanently  in  the  city,  and  those 
European  Governments  which  have 
found  it  wise  to  enjoy  a  monopoly  of 
their  home  tobacco  trade  are  repre- 
sented by  local  agents  who  make 
their  purchase  from  the  planters. 
Thousands  of  whites  and  blacks 
are  employed  in  the  huge  ware- 
houses, and  nineteen  factories,  with  a 
capital  of  850,000  dollars,  are  engaged  in  the  manufacture  of  chewing  tobacco. 
The  city  also  produces  twelve  millions  of  cigars  annually.  In  the  whiskey  trade 
a  large  capital  is  invested.  From  the  distilleries  in  the  Blue  Grass  region 
thousands  of  barrels,  filled  with  the  fluid  which  prompts  so  large  a  proportion 
of  the  homicides  in  the  State,  are  brought  to  Louisville,  and  it  is  said  that 
the  transactions  amount  to  five  millions  annually.  Pork-packers  also  make  the 
city  their  head- quarters,  and  in  the  sixty  days  of  each  year  between  November 
and  January  a  million  swine  pass  through  their  hands. 

As  a  live-stock  market,  Louisville  has  been  rapidly  growing  in  importance  for 
many  years.  The  stock-yards  there  now  cover  twenty  acres,  and  the  value  of 
the  stock  received  annually  is  between  twenty  and  thirty  millions.  The  flour- 
mills  yearly  yield  a  product  worth  four  millions.  The  trade  in  provisions  ag- 
gregates from  eleven  to  fifteen  millions ;  the  annual  product  of  iron  foots  up  five 


The  Court  -  House  —  Louisville. 


708 


PROSPECTIVE      GROWTH. 


millions,  and  more  than  1,500  hands  are  employed  in  the  manufacture  of  iron 
work,  while  in  the  foundries  500  hands  are  employed.  In  brief,  the  amount 
of  capital  invested  in    manufacturing  enterprises  in    the  city  is  about    twenty 

millions,  the  annual  product  fifty  - 
five  millions,  the  number  of  hands 
employed  16,000,  and  the  amount 
of  wages  paid  eight  millions. 

Louisville  would  be  an  admirable 
point  for  the  establishment  of  cotton- 
mills,  and  as  its  capitalists  have  had 
their  attention  favorably  directed  to 
the  large  dividends  which  Southern 
mills  are  yearly  paying,  it  is  hoped 
that  the  city  may  speedily  secure 
several  mills.  The  building  of 
steamboats  for  the  Western  waters 
has  long  been  one  of  the  leading 
industries  of  Louisville  and  the 
villages  clustered  about  the  Falls  of 
the  Ohio.  The  water  power  of  the 
Ohio  Falls  is  very  remarkable,  and 
ought  to  place  Louisville  among  the 
first  manufacturing  cities  of  the 
country.  It  has  thus  far  been  but 
little  utilized.  The  same  negligent  and  reckless  spirit  which  pervaded  others 
of  the  slave  States  in  regard  to  the  improvement  of  natural  advantages  con- 
trolled the  Kentuckian  mind,  and 
was  even  more  pronounced  in  Louis- 
ville and  its  vicinity  than  in  many 
places  further  south.  The  law  of 
Kentucky,  which  allowed  only  six 
per  cent,  interest,  was  an  effectual 
barrier  to  the  investment  of  foreign 
capital  in  Louisville,  and  drove  away 
much  local  capital  which  might  have 
been  invested.  The  enlargement  of 
the  present  Louisville  and  Portland 
canal,  which  was  completed  in  1828 
at  a  cost  of  $750,000,  would  render 
transportation  to  and  from  Louisville 
more  feasible ;  and  the  building  of  a 
new  canal  through  Portland  town 
would  furnish  a  superb  location, 
with  enormous  water  power  for  miles  of  factories  and  mills.  The  Louisville 
and  Nashville  railroad  gives  a  grand  trunk  line  from  Louisville  to  Montgomery, 


The  Cathedral — Louisville. 


The  Post  -  Office  —  Louisville. 


ITS     RAILWAY     CONNECTIONS. 


709 


Alabama,  a  distance  of  490  miles,  and  connection  with  the  railroad  system 
of  the  Southern  States,  which  are  Kentucky's  chief  market.  Louisville  is 
also  connected  by  the  Great  Bridge  spanning  the  Ohio,  with  all  the  rail- 
roads north  of  that  river,  and  is  directly  on  the  through  route  from  the  north 
and  west  to  the  extreme  south.  The  main  trunk  of  the  Louisville  and  Nash- 
ville railroad  extends  through  Jefferson,  Bullett,  Nelson,  Hardin,  Larue,  Hart, 
Edmondson,  Barren,  Warren,  and  Simpson  counties.  Branch  railroads,  connect- 
ing with  Memphis  and  South-eastern  Kentucky,  have  served  largely  to  develop 
the  regions  through  which  they  run.  The  so-called  Richmond  branch  runs  to 
within  a  short  distance  of  the  richest  iron  region  of  the  State.  The  Eliza- 
bethtown  and  Paducah  railroad  extends  from  Elizabethtown,  on  the  Louisville 
and  Nashville  railroad,  forty- two  miles  from  Louisville,  to  Paducah,  a  thriving 
city  on  the  Ohio,  fifty  miles  from  its  junction  with  the  Mississippi.  Paducah 
is  the  commercial  market  of  Western  Kentucky.  The  Owensboro,  Russelville 
and  Nashville,  the  Evansville,  Hen- 
derson and  Nashville,  the  Paducah 
and  Memphis,  and  the  Nashville  and 
Ohio  roads  also  traverse  Western 
Kentucky.  The  last-named  route 
gives  an  important  connection  with 
the  city  of  Mobile. 

Louisville  has  connection  with  the 
eastern  section  of  the  State  and  Cin- 
cinnati, by  the  Louisville,  Frankfort 
and  Lexington,  and  the  Short  Line, 
railroads.  The  former  runs  through 
Frankfort,  the  charming  capital  of 
Kentucky,  to  the  staid  and  solid  old 
city  of  Lexington,  which  is  the 
western  terminus  of  the  Big  Sandy 
railroad.  This  road  passes  through 
some  of  the  finest  agricultural  dis- 
tricts of  the  State,  pierces  the  very 
heart   of    the    mineral    region    of  The  city  HaH— Louisville. 

Kentucky,  and  is  designed  to  furnish   connection  with  the  Atlantic  ports  via 
the  Chesapeake  and  Ohio  Railroad  through  Western  Virginia. 

At  Lagrange,  twenty-eight  miles  from  Louisville,  the  Short  Line  railroad  to 
Covington,  opposite  Cincinnati,  on  the  Ohio  river,  crosses  the  Louisville,  Frank- 
fort and  Lexington  road.  The  Kentucky  Central  railroad  runs  through  Middle 
Kentucky,  and  from  Paris,  in  the  Blue  Grass  region,  the  Maysville  and  Lexing- 
ton road  branches  out. 

Many  new  railroads  are  chartered  in  Kentucky,  and  of  those  most  likely  soon 
to  be  built,  the  Cincinnati  Southern,  intended  to  furnish  a  line  from  Covington, 
on  the  Ohio,  to  Chattanooga,  Tennessee,  and  to  pursue  a  central  route  through 
Middle  Kentucky,  is  the  most  prominent.     The  Ohio  and  Cumberland  railroad, 


7i.o 


SANKS TAXATION  —  CREDIT. 


George  D.  Prentice —  (From  a  Painting  in  the  Louisville 
Public  Library). 


as  projected,  will  run  from  Covington  to  Nashville,  in  Tennessee,  and  the  Louis- 
ville, Memphis,  and  New  Orleans  road  is  intended  to  pierce  from  Louisville 
through  rich   agricultural  and  mineral  districts,  and  intersecting  important  lines 

of  rail,  to  Union  City,  where  it  will 
connect  with  routes  tributary  to  Mem- 
phis. The  railroads  that  are  already 
completed  in  Kentucky  penetrate  sixty- 
one  counties,  and  the  majority  of  them 
contribute  directly  to  the  prosperity  of 
Louisville.  In  addition  to  these,  as  a 
means  of  distributing  its  manufactured 
wares,  that  city  has  the  advantage  of 
navigable  streams,  embracing  an  extent 
of  16,000  miles. 

The  capital  stock  at  present  invested 
in  banks  and  banking  houses  in  Louis- 
ville is  about  ten  millions,  and  the 
deposit  capital  amounts  to  more  than 
eight  millions.  In  addition  to  these 
amounts,  Louisville  has  many  private 
capitalists.  The  law  of  Kentucky  now 
allows  ten  per  cent,  interest  upon  loans, 
and  it  is  probable  that  capital  from  all  sections  of  the  Union  will  flow  to 
Louisville  within  the  next  few  years.  The  bonded  debt  of  the  city  was 
$6,153,509  in  1872,  and  the  taxable  property  of  the  city  is  estimated  at 
$80,000,000.  The  credit  of  the  city  is 
excellent;  the  taxation  is  not  burden- 
some ;  the  municipal  government  is 
good.  There  are  few  better  lighted, 
better  paved,  or  better  policed  towns 
than  Louisville.  For  a  community 
where  three-fourths  of  the  male  citi- 
zens habitually  bear  arms,  shooting 
is  reasonably  rare,  although  not 
properly  punished  when,  under  the 
influence  of  liquor  or  passion,  it  does 
occur.  The  city  spreads  over  thirteen 
square  miles,  a  space  amply  sufficient 
to  furnish  dwellings  for  a  population 
of  half  a  million.  Building  is  cheap, 
tenement  houses  are  rare,  and  although 
a,  motley  gang  of  rough  men  from  the 
rivers  is  gathered  in  some  quarters  of  the  city,  but  little  lawlessness  prevails. 
The  public  buildings  of  Louisville  are  not  architecturally  fine.  The  City  Hall 
is  the  most  ambitious  structure,  and  the  council-room  in  which  the  municipal 


The  Colored  Normal  School  —  Louisville. 


EDIFICES CHURCHES  — GEORGE      D.      PRENTICE. 


7ir 


fathers  discuss  popular  measures  is  palatial.  The  Court- House  on  Jefferson 
street,  the  Louisville  University  Medical  College,  the  Blind  Asylum,  the  male 
and  female  High  Schools,  the  Custom -House  and  Post- Office  and  Masonic 
Temple  are  solid  and  substantial  edifices.  In  autumn  and  in  winter,  fogs  hover 
over  the  city,  and  the  coal  smoke,  joined  to  the  mists,  colors  the  walls  of  houses 
with  the  same  brown  so  noticeable  in  London  and  St.  Louis.  The  Cathedral  on 
Walnut  street,  St.  Paul's  Episcopal  Church,  and  the  First  Presbyterian,  opposite 
it,  are  fine  houses  of  worship.  Louisville  boasts  accommodation  for  50,000 
worshipers,  and  amongst  its  noteworthy  divines  is.  the  Rev.  Dr.  Stuart  Robinson, 
whose  Confederate  predilections  during  the  war  were  strongly  marked,  and  whose 


Louisville,  Kentucky,  on  the   Ohio  River,   from  the  New  Albany  Heights. 

ability  is  unquestionable.  The  new  Public  Library  at  present  occupies  a  small 
and  commodious  building,  soon  to  be  replaced,  when  the  drawings  of  the  Lottery 
are  completed,  by  a  finer  structure.  This  library,  although  at  present  no  larger 
than  those'  in  many  New  England  cities  one-third  the  size  of  Louisville,  is  ad- 
mirably selected,  finely  officered,  and  contains,  among  other  curiosities,  a  painting 
of  George  D.  Prentice,  as  he  appeared  in  middle-life.  The  celebrated  journalist, 
poet  and  politician,  lies  beside  his  son,  who  was  killed  while  in  the  ranks  of  the 
Confederates,  in  Cave  Hill  cemetery,  near  the  city. 

The  schools  of  Louisville  merit  great  praise.     The  public  school  system  is 
taking  a  firm  hold  there,  and  even  the  "  Steel  Blue  "  tendencies  of  the  majority 


712 


SCHOOLS  —  SCENERY. 


of  the  population,  and  their  refusal  to  believe  in  the  ultimate  elevation  of  the 
222,000  blacks  in  the  State,  have  not  hindered  them  from  supplying  the  colored 
population  with  excellent  facilities  for  education.  Louisville  has  two  high  schools* 
which  are,  in  every  respect,  first-class  seminaries,  twenty-three  ward  schools,  and 
a  host  of  private  institutions  for  English  and  classical  training.  The  school  build- 
ings will  seat  12,000  pupils.  Nearly  three-quarters  of  a  million  is  invested  in 
school  buildings  and  lots,  and  $150,000  is  annually  paid  in  salaries.  The  German 
language  is  taught  as  one  of  the  regular  branches  in  the  public  schools,  a  measure 
rendered  necessary,  as  in  St.  Louis,  by  the  influx  of  the  Teutonic  population.  The 
Colored  Normal  School  building,  dedicated  in  Louisville  last  year,  is  probably  the 
finest  public  school  edifice  designed  for  the  instruction  of  negroes  in  the  country. 
The  School  Board  has  established  training  departments  in  connection  with  some 
of  the  ward  schools,  and  these  are  rapidly  equipping  teachers. 

Although  there  is  no  impressive  scenery  in  the  vicinity  of  Louisville,  the 
green  lowlands,  the  wide  river,  and  the  vast  expanse  of  wooded  plain  are  very 
imposing.  From  the  hills  back  of  New  Albany,  on  the  Indiana  shore,  one  can 
look  down  on  the  huge  extent  of  Louisville  half- hidden  beneath  the  foliage  which 
surrounds  so  many  of  its  houses;  can  note  the  steamers  slowly  winding  about 
the  bends  in  the  Ohio,  or  carefully  working  their  way  up  to  the  broad  levees; 
can  see  the  trains  crawling  like  serpents  over  the  high  suspended  bridge,  and  the 
church  spires  and  towers  gleaming  under  the  mellow  sunlight.  In  a  few  years, 
if  the  improvements  now  in  progress  are  continued,  Louisville  will  be  one  of  the 
most  delightful  of  American  cities. 


Chimney  Rock,  Kentucky. 


LXXIX. 

FRANKFORT — THE      BLUE     GRASS      REGION — ALEXANDER'S      FARM. 

LEXINGTON. 

NOWHERE  is  the  Kentucky  river  more  beautiful  than  where  it  flows  past  the 
pretty  and  cultured  town  of  Frankfort,  the  capital  of  Kentucky,  sixty  miles 
above  its  entrance  into  the  Ohio.  For  many  miles  in  every  direction  superb 
landscapes  are  spread  out  before  the  traveler's  vision.  He  will  have  found  the 
ride  of  sixty-five  miles  from  Louisville  a  constant  panorama  of  fine  fields,  well- 


i*&S&?%:* 


w 


Frankfort,  on  the  Kentucky  River. 

kept  farms,  stone-fenced  and  thoroughly  cultivated.  Their  solid  building  and 
general  air  of  thrift  offers  a  sharp  contrast  to  the  scraggy  sheds  and  unpainted 
mansions  of  Southern  plantations.  In  the  train  the  traveler  will  find  the  typical 
Kentuckian,  tall,  smooth-faced,  with  clear  complexion,  and  bright  eyes,  his  man- 
ners deferential,  and  his  conversation  enjoyable.  In  the  manners  of  the  better 
class  of  Kentuckians  there  is  no  familiarity,  no  grossness  or  coarseness,  but  a 
frankness  only  slightly  tinged  with  formality. 


7H 


THE     CEMETERY—VIEW     FROM     IT. 


We  arrived  at  Frankfort  at  nightfall,  and  were  ushered  by  an  attentive  neero 

ZL\!:(vze  rr^  krn  as  the  capito1  h°^  -»**.  <ST£ 

sessions  of  the  Leg,slatnre,  is  crowded,  but  for  the  remainder  of  the  year  is  almost 
empty.     In*e  morning,  while  a  delicious  haze,  through  which  Te  sun   wi 

striving  to  peep,  overhung  the 
hills,  we  walked    through    the 
still    streets    bordered    with 
pretty   mansions,   and    stole 
along  the  steep  and  picturesque 
banks  of  the  Kentucky  to  the 
cemetery,  perched  on   a  high 
bluff,  where  stands  the  monu- 
ment above  the  grave  of  Daniel 
Boone.     Clambering  up  to  this 
lovely  spot    by  a   flight   of 
ancient  stone  steps,  and  passing 
the  crags  known  as  Umbrella 
and   Boone   rocks,  we   paused 
from  time  to  time,   fascinated 
with  the  beauty  of  the  tranquil 
stream  hundreds  of  feet  below 
us,  its  banks  fringed  with  love- 
Iiest  foliage  and  trees.      On  the 

The  Ascent  to  Frankfort  Cemetery,  Kentucky.  „•       1-     ,      *  , 

of  logs  which  had  been  drifted  down  from  the  mouX  'ZZZi!^    "* 

Frankfort  lies  m  a  deep  valley  surrounded  by  sharply-defined  hills  the  river 

he  e  flowing  between  high  limestone  banks,  from  which  is  quarried    he  adml 

i~ ■  biui  r:  ?*? the  town  is  partiaiiy  constr-ted-  ^t 

cemetery  bluff  the   town  looks  as   picturesque   as   an   Italian   city.      Clustered 

of'lell  "Ve,;bank  tHe  WMe  bUMingS  fom  a  Zro»P  which  has  none 

of  the  unpleasant  angles  so  common  in  America.       The  village  of  South  Frank- 
fort is  connected  with  the  main  town  by  a  covered  bridge  over  the  stream,  and  in 

tlouTZ  Sm0°th'  m'6'  T^™^  ™ads  ^etch  out  over  the  hills  and 
through  the  ravines  Near  the  city  there  are  many  fine  estates,  on  which  the 
noted  horses  and  cattle  of  the  Blue  Grass  regions  are  raised.  The  State  Arsenal 
»  an  ummposmg  building  on  a  pretty  eminence.  The  ruins  of  the  old  State 
Capitol  occupy  a  conspicuous  elevation,  and  the  new  State-House,  now  in  process 
of  completion,  stands  on  a  handsome  lawn.  The  Penitentiarylwhere  at  the 
time  of  our  visit,  700  convicts,  equally  divided  among  whites  and  blacks,  were 
wWh  '„  Tt*^  h«°P  **  ™tting_is  an  unpicturesque  structure 
whose  high  walls  have  not  prevented  the  occasional  escape  of  prisoners      Fach 

ircZreteT^"^  t07eSVe  I5°  ^^  °f  matti"g  ^  "*  after  hisEtaa^ 
hi,  r7    w  , t0  rep°Se  UntH    niehtfal1'  wh«  he   is  locked  up  in 

his.cell.     We  saw  several  of  the  blacks  improving  their  time  by  reading    but 
most  of  the  prisoners  who  had  finished  their  daily  toil  were  sullenly  chewing 


THE      PENITENTIARY KU-KLUX. 


715 


tobacco,  and  contemplating  the  gloomy  walls  of  the  dark  rooms  in  which  they 
had  been  working.  The  keepers  of  the  Penitentiary  regaled  us  with  stories  of 
adventurous  people  who  in  the  old  days  had  been  confined  for  negro  stealing. 
In  the  Hospital  we  saw  a  fine  athletic  man  crouching  over  a  table  with  his  head 
held  wearily  behind  his  hands.  This  was  the  forger  Atwood,  whose  reckless  folly 
brought  him  from  the  centre  of  a  brilliant  society  to  a  term  of  twenty  years  in  jail- 
Manufacturing  is  creeping  into  the  capital,  although  prominent  society  neither 
seeks  nor  cares  for  it.  Farming,  the  distilling,  of  pure  whiskeys  from  the  golden 
grain  which  grows  so  abundantly  in  the  vicinity,  the  breeding  and  care  of  race- 
horses, and  visiting  and  junketing  in  all  the  country  side,  content  the  Kentucki- 
ans.  Aside  from  the  stir  created  by  the  assemblage  of  politicians  there  is  but 
little  thus  far  to  trouble  the  dreamy  repose  and  enviable  tranquillity  by  which 
Frankfort  is  characterized.  It  is  the  home  of  many  of  the  loveliest  women  in 
the  country,  and  its  society  is  largely  represented  in  all  the  cities  of  the  world. 
Its  belles,  and  those  of  Lexington,  lead  the  fashion  at  the  Southern  "  Springs." 

While  we  were  at  Frankfort  the  Ku-Klux  were  engaged  in  active  operations 
in  the  neighboring  counties,  and  the  residents  of  Frankfort  denounced  them  as  a 
band  of  ruffians  whose  main  object 
was  revenge.  One  gentleman  asserted 
that  he  would  at  any  time  help  with  his 
own  hands  to  lynch  a  certain  member 
of  the  gang,  if  he  could  be  caught.  In 
Owen  and  Henry  counties  these  mid- 
night marauders  had  inaugurated  a 
veritable  reign  of  terror.  They  took 
"niggers"  from  their  houses  and 
whipped  them  on  most  trivial  provo- 
cation. They  waylaid  those  who  had 
dared  to  testify  against  them  in  court, 
and  "  fixed"  them  from  behind  bushes. 
Clad  in  fantastic  disguises,  they  hov- 
ered about  the  confines  of  large 
towns,  carrying  dread  into  the  hearts 
of  superstitious  blacks.  The  colored 
people  living  in  the  outskirts  of 
Frankfort  had  deserted  their  homes 
and  flocked  into  the  town,  giving  as 
their  reason  that  they  were  afraid  of 
the  Ku-Klux.  It  is  hardly  fair  to 
presume  that  political  bitterness  has 
been  so  much  concerned  in  prompting  the  actions  of  these  prowlers  as  have 
ignorance  and  the  general  lawlessness — all  too  prevalent  in  the  back-country 
of  Kentucky. 

Between  Louisville  and  Frankfort,  at  La  Grange,  a  branch  road  diverges  to 
Shelbyville.    This  pretty  town  stands  in  the  midst  of  a  luxuriantly  fertile  country, 
46 


•vl^fl 


The  Monument  to  Daniel  Boone  in  the  Cemetery  at 
Frankfort,  Kentucky. 


yi6 


SHELBYVILLE  — HARRODSBURG     SPRINGS DOCTOR      GRAHAM, 


has  many  manufactories,  a  fine  court-house,  numerous  churches,  three  flourishing; 
seminaries,  and  is  the  seat  of  Shelby  College,  founded  in  1836.  Thirty  miles 
below  Frankfort,  on  an  eminence  near  the  far-famed  Salt  river,  so  well  known  in 
political  jargon,  is  Harrodsburg,  the  oldest  settlement  in  the  State,  where  Captain 
James  Harrod,  in  1774,  erected  a  cabin  in  the  wilderness.  Harrodsburg  has  been 
visited  by  thousands  from  East  and  West,  and  it  is  to-day  the  most  famous  sum- 
mer resort  in  the  State,  its  mineral  springs  being  a  prime  attraction.  It  is  also 
the  seat  of  old  Bacon  College  and  a  good  military  academy.  In  18 19  Christo- 
pher Graham  went  to  Harrodsburg  with  a  few  dollars  in  his  pocket,  and  for 
thirty-two  years  thereafter  was  the  patron  of  the  springs,  bringing  into  the 
State  more  than  $4,0,00,000,  the  expenditure  of  visitors  from  all  parts  of  the 
world.     The   Presbyterian    Female  College   and  the   Christian  Baptist  College 


,8fev$a£->    ill 


?*&&k 


m,  gassasss  -  _ 


View  on  the  Kentucky  River,  near  Frankfort. 

at  Harrodsburg  owe  their  existence  to  Doctor  Graham.  He  also  created  and 
paved,  at  his  own  expense,  the  first  street  in  the  town.  In  three  decades,  and 
by  his  own  exertions,  he  so  beautified  this  lovely  spot  that  when  Generals  Scott 
and  Wool  were  delegated  by  Congress  to  prepare  an  asylum  in  the  West  for 
invalid  soldiers,  they  bought  a  site  at  Harrodsburg  for  $100,000,  and  built  on  it. 
a  fine  edifice,  which  was  long  ago  burned. 

Nine  miles  from  Frankfort,  on  the  road  to  Lexington,  stands  one  of  the  finest 
and  richest  farms  in  Kentucky — that  owned  by  Mr.  Alexander.  On  this  superb 
stock-farm  we  saw  300  blooded  horses,  ranging  in  rank  from  old  "Lexington," 
the  monarch  of  the  turf,  to  the  kittenish  and  frisky  yearling.  Here  also  Mr.  Alex- 
ander has  collected  $100,000  worth  of  cattle,  comprising  some  of  the  finest  stock 
in  the  world.  Peeping  into  the  inclosure  where  the  costly  cattle  were  kept, 
we  saw  one  diminutive  heifer  worth  $27,000,  and  a  variety  of  foreign  creatures 


ALEXANDER  S   FARM JOHN   HARPER  S. 


717 


whose  value  seemed  almost  fabulous.  On  this  farm  are  bred  the  great  majority 
of  the  fine  trotting  and  running  horses  which  appear  in  our  parks  during  the 
racing  season.  Mr.  Alexander's  estate,  which  is  admirably  stocked  with  fine 
farm-houses,  barns  and  stables,  and  is  more  like  a  ducal  manor  than  the 
ordinary  American  farm,  extends  over  3,200  acres.  Near  by  is  old  John 
Harper's  modest  farm  of  2,000  acres.  The  roads,  the  stone  walls,  and  the  fine 
lawns  covered  with  massive  shade- trees,  make  a  series    of  delightful   pictures. 


Asteroid  Kicks  Up. 

The  annual  sale  of  horses  on  the  Alexander  farm  occurs  in  June.  Only  yearling 
colts  are  sold.  Hundreds  of  people  from  all  the  country  around,  and  from 
every  State  in  the  Union,  flock  to  this  sale.  An  immense  barbecue  is  held,  and 
high  wassail  marks  the  conclusion  of  the  occasion. 

We  paid  a  respectful  visit  to  old  "  Lexington,"  the  mighty  sire  of  a  mightier 
equine  family.  He  is  now  quite  blind,  a  veteran  of  twenty- two,  afflicted  with 
goitre,  and  stood  gazing  in  the  direction  from  which  our  voices  came,  a  melan- 
choly wreck  of  his  former  greatness.  The  princes  of  the  race-course  of  the 
present  galloped  by,  neighing  and  pawing  the  ground,  as  if  annoyed  at  our 
presence.  One  of  them,  named  "Asteroid,"  so  far  forgot  his  princely  dignity  as 
to  charge  incontinently  upon  the  fence  where  we  were  seated,  and  the  artist  has 
depicted  the  result  in  a  spirited  sketch.  The  negro  men  who  manage  these 
erratic  brutes  undergo  all  sorts  of  perilous  adventures,  but  they  seem  to  possess 
as  many  lives  as  a  cat,  and,  like  that  animal,  always  land  on  their  feet,  no  matter 
how  far  the  plunging  and  rearing  horses  may  throw  them. 

Except  the  negligence  of  her  people  with  regard  to  their  own  interests,  and 
the  prejudices  which  still,  in  many  quarters,  survive  the  death  of  the  slavery 
regime,  there  is  no  reason  why  Kentucky  should  not  already  have  received  a 
mighty  current  of  immigration.  Rich  in  all  the  elements  of  material  greatness, 
abounding  in  mineral  and  agricultural  lands,  noble  rivers,  and  superb  forests,  it  is 


7 1  8  THE   BLUE   GRASS   REGION LEXINGTON. 

astonishing  that  great  wealth  is  not  more  general  among  the  people  of  the  State. 
Lying  between  390  and  360  30'  north  latitude,  her  climate  is  delightful,  and  her 
situation,  between  the  two  greatest  water-sheds  of  the  continent,  affords  her  easy 
communication  with  twelve  of  the  largest  and  wealthiest  of  her  sister  States. 

The  Green,  the  Kentucky,  and  the  Barren  rivers  are  all  navigable,  and  run 
through  regions  which  can  readily  furnish  them  an  immense  commerce.  The 
area  of  the  State  is  37,700  square  miles,  the  larger  part  of  which  is  more  than 
eight  hundred  feet  above  the  level  of  the  sea.  The  farming  region,  in  Middle 
Kentucky,  which  includes  the  territory  between  the  mountains  of  the  east  and 
the  lower  lands  lying  west  of  the  Louisville  and  Nashville  railroad,  and  extend- 
ing from  the  northern  to  the  southern  boundary,  is  superb.  Within  this  tract 
of  ten  thousand  square  miles  all  the  cereals,  hemp,  flax,  and  every  kind  of  vege- 
table and  fruit  flourish  magnificently.  In  Middle  Kentucky  lies  the  famous 
"  Blue  Grass  Region,"  of  which  I  have  already  spoken,  which  has  long  been 
noted  for  its  beautiful  women,  its  Bourbon  whiskey  and  Bourbon  Democrats,  its 
Lexingtons  and  Asteroids,  its  Alexanders,  and  its  •"  Old  John  Harper."  Fay- 
ette, Bourbon,  Scott,  Woodford,  Clark,  Jessamine,  and  portions  of  other  counties 
in  this  region,  owe  much  to  the  beds  of  blue  shell  limestone  and  marble  which 
underlie  them,  the  upper  soil,  which  is  a  dark  loam  with  a  red  clay  subsoil, 
being  astonishingly  fertile.  These  fair  lands  are  carpeted  throughout  the  year 
with  a  brilliant  blue  grass.  Even  in  midwinter  a  deep  green  clothes  the  soil, 
and,  when  summer  comes,  the  grass  sends  up  slender  shafts  to  the  height  of 
several  feet,  crowned  with  feathery  tufts  of  a  bright  blue  color.  The  effect  of 
a  landscape  clad  in  this  noble  herbage,  and  dotted  here  and  there  with  fine  oaks 
and  well-kept  farm-houses,  is  exceedingly  fine.  Throughout  Fayette,  Woodford, 
Scott,  and  Bourbon  counties,  lands  are  worth  from  $80  to  $140  per  acre,  and 
highly-cultivated  farms  of  from  250  to  300  acres  are  abundant.  There  hemp 
yields  from  eight  to  fourteen  hundred  pounds  per  acre,  and  tobacco  flourishes 
even  on  the  second-rate  lands.  Montgomery  county  is  interspersed  with  fields 
and  meadows,  studded  with  stately  forests  in  which  the  blue  grass  grows  as  luxu- 
riantly as  in  the  cleared  lands.  In  the  forest  pastures  are  bred  the  magnificent 
cattle  and  horses  for  which  Kentucky  is  so  famous.  The  chief  advantage  which 
the  Blue  Grass  region  possesses  over  any  other  in  the  State  is  in  its  unequaled 
pasturage,  and  in  the  richness  of  its  timber-lands.  From  it  are  annually  exported 
thousands  of  noble  horses  and  cattle,  and  immense  droves  of  sheep,  mules  and 
hogs  are  sent  to  the  cotton-fields  of  the  South. 

Lexington,  one  of  the  most  wealthy  and  beautiful  of  Kentucky  cities,  is 
charmingly  situated  on  the  lower  fork  of  the  Elkhorn  river.  The  early  pioneers 
and  adventurers,  who  established  the  town  in  the  midst  of  a  wilderness,  found 
there  the  remains  of  a  great  fortress  and  a  mighty  people  whose  history  has  not 
been  written.  The  present  city  is  built  above  the  ruins  of  mounds  and  fortifica- 
tions, totally  different  from  those  erected  by  the  Indians,  and  evidently  of  great 
extent  and  magnificence.  A  few  years  before  the  first  prominent  white  settle- 
ment was  made  there,  the  entrance  to  an  ancient  catacomb  was  discovered  by 
some  hunters,  and  embalmed  bodies  were  found  in  it.     For  three-quarters  of  a 


ORIGIN      OF      ITS      NAME ITS      FOUNDER. 


719 


century  the  entrance  to  this  subterranean  cemetery  has  been  hidden,  and  the 
Kentuckians  of  to-day  even  doubt  its  existence.  Lexington  was  the  starting- 
point  of  Kentucky  and  the  centre  from  which  radiated  all  the  movements  that 
finally  ended  in  the  conquering  of  the  savage  and  the  domination  by  the  whites 
in  the  West.  In  1775,  the  hunters  from  Harrodsburg  took  possession  of  the  north 
side  of  the  Kentucky  river,  and  the  place  where  they  first  halted  was  near 
Lexington.  A  spring  from  which  they  drank  is  still  pointed  out.  The  town  was 
named  after  Lexington  in  Massachusetts  by  the  hunters,  into  whose  forest  retreat 


A   Souvenir  of  Kentucky. 


the  news  had  crept  that  King  George's  troops,  on  the  19th  of  April,  had  shot 
down  the  American  rebels  in  Massachusetts  colony  at  Lexington.  Kentucky  was 
then  a  wild  territory,  belonging  to  the  royal  province  of  Virginia,  and  it  is  not  a 
little  strange  that  there,  in  the  midst  of  an  unbroken  forest,  was  raised  the  first 
monument  to  the  first  dead  of  the  American  Revolution. 

The  founder  of   Lexington  was  Colonel  Robert  Patterson,   the  compeer  of 
Boone,  Kenton,   and  other  forest  pioneers  whose  names  arc  famous.      For  half  a 


720 


ASHLAND THE      UNIVERSITY. 


century  after  its  foundation,  Lexington  had  a  brilliant  history.  To-day  it  is  a 
quiet  town,  the  home  of  many  wealthy  families  and  the  Mecca  of  thousands  of 
pilgrims,  as  it  contains  the  old  residence  and  the  grave  of  Henry  Clay.  A 
monument  to  the  illustrious  statesman  stands  in  the  beautiful  cemetery  of  Lex- 
ington, on  an  eminence  near  the  centre  of  the  grounds,  and  is  a  landmark  for 
miles  around.      It  was  completed  in  i860,  at  a  cost  of  $50,000. 

"  Ashland,"  the  old  Clay  homestead,  is  situated  a  mile  and  a-half  from  the 
city,  in  the  midst  of  beautiful  parks,  closely  resembling  the  manors  of  Eng- 
land. During  Mr.  Clay's  lifetime  the  estate  was  ornamented  with  loveliest  shade- 
trees  and  orchards  in  profusion,  and  the  road  which  leads  to  the  mansion,  now 
the  residence  of  Regent  Bowman,  of  the  Kentucky  University,  is  lined  with 
locusts,  cypresses,  and  cedars,  through  which  peep  the  rose,  the  jessamine,  and  the 
ivy.  The  old  mansion,  replaced  in  1857  by  a  beautiful  modern  residence,  was 
a  plain,  unpretending  structure,  in  which  Mr.  Clay  at  various  times  had  enter- 
tained a  host  of  distinguished  Americans  and  foreigners.  Lexington  is  also 
the  location  of  the  Kentucky  University  and  the  State  Lunatic  Asylum ;  the 
former  institution,  founded  on  the  ruins  of  Transylvania  University,  has  an 
endowment  of  $500,000,  a  fine  library,  and  its  law  and  medical  schools  have 
long  been  renowned.  The  present  University  was  incorporated  in  1858,  its 
original  endowment  having  been  obtained  by  the  efforts  of  the  present  Regent, 
John  B.  Bowman,  a  native  of  Kentucky,  who  was  also  instrumental  in  the  con- 
solidation of  the  Universities  of  Harrodsburg,  Transylvania,  and  the  Agricultural 
College  at  Lexington.  The  first  session  of  the  Kentucky  University  was  in 
1865,  and  the  grounds  of  the  Agricultural  and  Mechanical  College,  which  now 
comprise  "Ashland,"  and  the  adjoining  estate  of  "Woodlands  "  were  purchased 
in  1866. 


A  little  Adventure  by  the  Wayside. 


LXXX. 

POLITICS     IN     KENTUCKY  —  MINERAL     RESOURCES     OF     THE     STATE. 

POLITICAL  questions  in  Kentucky  have  lately  been  more  agitated  than  for 
many  years  since  the  war.  The  discussion  of  the  Civil  Rights  bill  has 
been  as  furious  and  illogical  there  as  in  any  other  of  the  ex-slave  States.  The 
freedmen  do  not  constitute  a  troublesome  element  in  the  commonwealth.  There 
are  222,000  of  them,  while  the  whole  population  of  the  State  is  1,331,000  souls. 
Some  of  the  oldest  and  stiffest  Bourbon  Democrats  have  of  late  shown  gratifying 
tendencies  toward  liberality  in  educational  matters,  and,  indeed,  it  may  with 
reason  be  hoped  that  Kentucky  will  soon  be  ranked  among  the  progressive 
States  which  desire  immigration,  education,  and  manufactures, — the  three  things 
which  alone  can  build  up  States  once  consecrated  to  slavery. 

A  brief  sketch  of  the  progress  of  Kentucky  politics  may  not  be  uninterest- 
ing. Kentucky  was  a  Whig  State,  faithful  to  Henry  Clay  as  long  as  he  lived, 
and  a  worshiper  of  his  theories  after  he  died.  The  Whig  feeling  is  still  very 
strong  among  some  of  the  older  voters.  A  prominent  editor  in  the  State  told 
me  that  he  could  remember  when  it  was  not  good  ton  to  be  a  Democrat,  just  as 
since  the  war  it  has  not  been  fashionable  to  be  a  Republican.  When  the  Whig 
party  died,  after  Scott's  defeat,  the  masses  of  the  Whigs  went  into  the  Know- 
Nothing  movement,  and  the  Democrats  opposed  it,  although,  during  the  battle, 
a  good  many  Whigs  and  Democrats  changed  sides.  In  the  Fillmore  and  Bu- 
chanan canvass,  the  State  sided  with  Buchanan,  and  the  Know-Nothing  party 
died. 

Then  the  Whigs,  still  unwilling  to  coincide  with  the  Democrats,  formed  what 
was  called  the  Opposition  Party,  and,  in  1859,  ran  Bell  for  Governor  against 
McGoffin,  who  was  a  Douglas  Squatter-Sovereignty  Democrat;  but  Bell,  for  the 
purpose  of  making  political  capital,  took  extreme  view^pvith  regard  to  the  rights 
of  the  South  in  the  territories,  and  compelled  McGoffin  to  come  on  to  his 
ground.  This,  it  is  considered,  was  very  unfortunate  in  its  effect  on  the  temper 
of  the  State. 

When  the  Secession  movement  came  up,  eighteen  months  afterward,  it  had  a 
good  deal  to  do  with  creating  the  neutrality  position  taken  by  the  leading  men 
of  the  State,  in  the  winter  of  i860,  as  a  measure  of  necessity  for  holding  the 
masses  of  the  people  steady  for  a  time  against  the  wave  of  Secession  excitement. 
The  division  of  the  Democrats  between  Breckenridge  and  Douglas,  in  i860,  gave 
the  State  to  Bell  and  Everett.  The  Douglas  men  -were  nearly  all  Unionists. 
When  the  Southern  States  began  the  Secession  movement,  after  the  election  of 
Mr.  Lincoln,  the  Kentucky  Legislature,  which  had  been  elected  in  1859  during 


722  PARTIES — FIFTEENTH      AMENDMENT. 

the  excitement  raised   by  the  Bell-McGomn  canvass  for  the  Governorship,  was 
found  to  be  nearly  divided  between  Union  men  and  Southern  sympathizers. 

In  the  election  of  1861,  for  "Peace  Commissioners,"  Congressmen,  and 
Legislators,  the  Union  men  were  successful  by  large  majorities,  and  they  retained 
control  of  the  State  until  1 866,  although  it  is  said  that  the  Emancipation  Procla- 
mation, and  the  course  of  injudicious  military  commanders  in  the  State,  greatly 
weakened  the  Union  party,  which  was  gradually  divided  into  unconditional 
Union  men  and  "  Union  Democrats."  The  straight-out  Democrats,  mostly 
Secessionists,  tried  to  hold  a  convention  at  Frankfort  in  1862,  but  were  pre- 
vented by  the  Post  Commander.  They  sent  delegates,  however,  to  the  Chicago 
Convention  in  1864.  Those  delegates  were  received,  and  divided  seats  with  the 
Union  Democrats.  The  unconditional  Union  men,  who  voted  for  Mr.  Lincoln 
in  1864  in  Kentucky,  formed  the  basis  of  the  present  Republican  party  in  the 
State,  but  did  not  call  themselves  Republicans  until  the  convention  of  May,  1867. 

The  Union  Legislature,  during  the  war,  passed  an  act  expatriating  all  citizens 
who  had  left  the  State  for  the  purpose  of  aiding  the  Confederacy.  The  last 
Union  Legislature,  in  1865  and  '66  repealed  this  act,  and  welcomed  the  return 
of  the  Confederates  to  their  allegiance.  The  Democratic  party  was  organized  in. 
1866,  and  gained  possession  of  the  county  offices.  The  unconditional  Union 
men  cooperated  with  the  Union  Democrats  in  this  canvass.  The  next  year  the 
Union  men  took  their  stand  with  the  Republican  party,  and  nominated  a 
candidate  for  Governor.  The  Union  Democrats  also  nominated  a  candidate. 
They  were  called  before  the  election  the  "third  party,"  and  after  it,  from 
their  small  show  of  strength,  the  "one-third  party."  The  Democrats,  em- 
bracing the  Secession  element,  and  the  dissatisfied  Union  men,  also  made  a. 
nomination. 

The  "  third  party"  embraced  nearly  all  the  old  Union  leaders,  but  few  of 
the  rank  and  file,  and  cast  but  13,000  votes.  A  Democratic  Governor  was 
elected,  and  Secession  Democrats  have  filled  the  Governor's  chair  ever  since. 

By  the  adoption  of  the  fifteenth  amendment  about  45,000  additional  voters 
were  placed  upon  the  lists,  but  not  more  than  35,000  of  them  have  ever  voted  at 
an  election.  The  Republicans  have  been  slowly  but  steadily  gaining  ground  in 
the  Legislature  for  some  years.  They  are  still  in  a  small  minority.  THeir  policy 
has  been  to  win  back  tl||,  old  Union  men  from  the  Democracy,  with  whom  their 
associations  have  not  always  been  pleasant.  It  is  from  that  source  mainly  that 
the  Republicans  have  gained  their  strength.  The  Democrats  are  divided  up  by 
lines  which  cross  one  another  in  a  variety  of  ways,  into  the  "  Stay-at-home  sym- 
pathizers," the  Confederate  soldiers,  the  Bourbons,  and  the  "  Progressives."  The 
Stay-at-homes  have  repeatedly  concluded  that  the  Confederates  were  too  grasp- 
ing, and  the  Bourbons  have  shriekingly  accused  the  Progressives  of  infidelity  to 
party.  The  balance  of  power  has  swayed  in  every  direction ;  but  the  Bourbons 
and  Confederates  now  control  the  State.  The  feeling  that  the  Democratic  party 
of  Kentucky  was  in  many  respects  an  "  unreconciled  "  party,  and  that  it  sanc- 
tioned the  lawlessness  of  the  Ku-Klux,  has  led  the  Republicans  to  adhere  to  the 
national  organization  of  their  oarty,  without  paying  much  attention  to  the  ques-- 


FREE     SCHOOLS PUBLIC      DEBT.  723 

tions  which  have  caused  dissension  among  Northern  Republicans.  They  still 
regard  the  predominance  of  the  Republican  party  in  national  affairs  as  more  im- 
portant to  them  than  the  justification  of  party  measures.  If  the  negro  question 
were  out  of  the  politics  of  the  State,  there  would  be  no  trouble  on  account  of  the 
old  Union  and  Secession  differences.  The  feeling  in  relation  to  it  had  been  toned 
down  to  a  manageable  point,  when  the  discussion  of  the  Civil  Rights  bill  revived 
it  in  all  its  old  bitterness  and  intensity. 

The  Progressives  in  the  Democratic  party  have  among  them  individuals  who 
take  strong  ground  in  favor  of  general  education,  but  the  opposition  to  common 
schools  among  the  wealthier  classes  is  very  powerful.  The  first  law  for  the  estab- 
lishment of  a  general  system  of  common  schools  in  Kentucky  was  enacted  in 
1838,  but  the  continued  war  made  upon  it  disgusted  the  friends  of  the  move- 
ment, and  they  did  but  little  for  many  years  thereafter.  In  1 867  a  series  of  liberal 
reforms  in  the  then  prostrate  school  system  was  planned,  and  a  bill  inaugurating 
the  reform  finally  passed  the  Legislature  in  1869—70.  The  result  of  the  opera- 
tion of  the  new  law  was  the  doubling  of  the  number  of  children  in  the  common 
schools,  and  a  general  advance  in  education  throughout  the  State.  The  Board 
of  Education  is  composed  of  the  Attorney- General,  the  Secretary  of  State,  and 
the  Superintendent  of  Public  Instruction. 

While  it  may  be  said  that  there  are  free  schools  in  most  of  the  districts  in 
Kentucky,  it  is  evident  that  many  of  them  are  but  poorly  sustained  for  a  few 
months  in  the  year,  and  are  not  patronized  enough  by  the  influential  classes  to- 
give  them  vitality  and  value.  All  the  populous  and  flourishing  towns  have  high 
schools  and  private  academies,  and  the  many  colleges,  either  sectarian  or  estab- 
lished by  private  enterprise,  receive  the  youth  who,  in  other  States,  are  educated 
in  public  schools.  Outside  of  the  cities,  although  some  provision  is  made  for  the 
education  of  the  colored  children,  the  whites  feel  but  little  interest  in  it,  and 
Berea  College,  in  the  mountain  district,  is  probably  the  only  mixed  college  in  the 
State.  An  address  recently  made  by  Colonel  Stodart  Johnson,  of  Kentucky, 
containing  a  strong  plea  for  educational  progress,  excited  considerable  unfriendly 
criticism. 

The  public  debt  of  Kentucky  is  but  a  trifling  sum,  and  the  "  powers  that  be " 
are  very  scrupulous  with  regard  to  incurring  liabilities, —  so  much  so  that  they 
begrudge  the  money  which  might  be  expended  in  furthering  the  State's  interest. 
The  total  State  tax,  at  present,  is  forty- five  cents  on  one  hundred  dollars,  and 
real  estate  is  rarely  assessed  at  more  than  half  its  value. 

Eastern  Kentucky  may  be  said  to  be  one  immense  bed  of  coal  and  iron.  The 
territory  of  the  State  extends  over  much  of  the  area  of  two  of  the  largest  and 
richest  coal-fields  on  the  continent.  The  great  Appalachian  coal-field  extends 
through  its  eastern  section,  and  extensive  coal-measures  are  found,  and  have 
been  worked,  in  a  score  of  the  eastern  counties.  This  coal-field  embraces 
nearly  all  the  mountain  counties  drained  by  the  Big  Sandy  river,  the  Kentucky 
above  its  forks,  and  the  Cumberland  above  its  shoals.  The  upper  coal-measures 
of  this  eastern  coal-field  embrace  very  rich  beds,  containing  from  sixty  to 
sixty-three  per  cent,  of  fixed  carbon.     The  yield  cf  the  entire  region   is  rich, 


724  IRON   ORES COAL   IN   WESTERN   KENTUCKY. 

averaging  from  fifty-eight  to  sixty-three  per  cent.  Coal  crops  out  along  the 
banks  of  the  Big  Sandy  river,  and  is  easily  worked  and  readily  transportable  to 
market.  On  the  Kentucky  and  Cumberland  fine  workable  beds  of  coal  are  also 
found.  The  iron  ore  is  always  closely  associated  with  coal.  Iron-furnaces  might 
be  established  with  profit  throughout  the  entire  group  of  mountain  counties,  from 
the  Big  Sandy  to  the  level  lands  of  Middle  Kentucky,  and  from  the  Ohio  river  to 
the  Tennessee  line. 

In  many  counties  red  and  brown  hematites  and  the  Black  Band  ores,  resem- 
bling those  from  which  iron  is  chiefly  made  in  Europe,  are  abundant.  The 
minerals  of  Eastern  Kentucky  are  its  main  resource,  for  the  only  lands  of  medium 
fertility  are  to  be  found  along  the  streams.  The  hill-sides,  from  which  the  inhabi- 
tants dig  with  difficulty  a  scanty  sustenance,  are  poor  in  quality.  Mineral  springs 
are  scattered  throughout  the  eastern  section,  and  the  fine  climate  and  the  lovely 
scenery  of  the  Kentucky  mountains  will  doubtless  give  them  in  due  time  the 
reputation  won  by  those  of  Western  and  South-western  Virginia. 

In  Estill  county,  on  the  Red  river,  a  small  tributary  of  the  Kentucky,  is  an  iron 
district  which  has  attained  a  world-wide  reputation.  The  Red  River  Iron  Works, 
located  near  the  mouth  of  the  stream,  began  operations  in  1808.  Rude  furnaces 
were  built  there  in  that  year,  and  the  soft  ores  of  the  district  were  roughly  con- 
verted into  pig-iron.  In  succeeding  years  better  furnaces  were  erected,  and  since 
the  war  the  property  has  passed  into  the  hands  of  a  wealthy  stock  company, 
which  now  owns  60,000  acres  of  mineral  and  timber  lands,  and  is  much  in  need 
of  railroad  facilities.  Another  corporation,  known  as  the  Cottage  Iron  Company, 
also  owns  13,000  acres  of  fine  mineral  land  in  the  vicinity.  These  companies 
together  employ  a  thousand  workmen,  and  annually  expend  half  a  million  dollars 
in  the  manufacture  of  metals  used  exclusively,  for  car-wheels.  When  these 
furnaces  are  put  in  connection  with  the  markets,  by  an  already  projected  rail- 
way, the  number  of  tons  of  pig-iron  manufactured  in  the  State,  which  in  1870 
was  37,548,  will  be  vastly  increased. 

The  coal-field  of  Western  Kentucky  is  seventy-five  miles  in  length  and  fifty- 
five  miles  in  width  at  the  widest  part,  having  an  average  width  of  perhaps  forty 
miles.  The  Elizabethtown  and  Paducah  railroad  runs  through  its  entire  length, 
and  it  is  traversed  by  several  other  railroads.  The  coal  and  iron  ores  have  as 
yet  been  but  little  developed,  but  will  evidently  repay  an  active  mining. 
Through  the  southern  portion  of  Western  Kentucky  there  are  large  veins  of 
lead  ore  said  to  contain  considerable  silver,  but  the  operations  in  mining  these 
ores  have  been  very  imperfect.  Twelve  of  the  western  counties  overlie  coal- 
measures,  and  in  Union,  Henderson,  and  Davis  counties  there  are  many  work- 
able beds  of  coal  with  an  average  thickness  of  four  feet.  According  to  the 
testimony  of  General  Basil  Duke,  the  richest  coals  of  the  Western  Kentucky 
fields,  possessing  an  average  of  more  than  fifty  per  cent,  of  fixed  carbon,  are 
found  in  the  lower  coal-measures,  which  in  a  depth  of  900  feet  contain  ten 
workable  beds  having  a  united  thickness  of  more  than  thirty  feet. 

The  above-mentioned  counties  are  also  exceedingly  rich  in  agricultural 
resources.      Alluvial  deposits  in  the  bottoms  along  the  Ohio  river,  and  the  loam 


FERTILITY     OF     THE     SOIL  —  PRICES. 


725 


of  the  uplands,  furnish  a  superb  soil  on  which  fine  crops  of  tobacco  are  raised 
and  the  Indian  corn  is  as  large  as  that  of  the  best  blue  grass  land.  All  these 
counties  lying  along  the  Ohio  are  very  fertile,  and  their  lands  command  high 
prices.  The  counties  near  the  confluence  of  the  Ohio  and  Mississippi  rivers, 
composed  of  the  sediment  of  both  streams,  produce  fine  crops  of  tobacco,  wheat, 
corn,  and  grasses.  Labor  and  immigrants  are  everywhere  in  demand  in  this 
part  of  the  State.  Western  Kentucky  produces  the  great  bulk  of  the  tobacco 
crop  of  the  State,  although  this  staple  is  cultivated  in  many  other  counties.  The 
farms  in  some  portions  of  this  section  are  now  too  large  to  be  managed  under 
the  present  labor  system,  and  proprietors  will  occasionally  sell  acres  which  before 
the  war  brought  $90,  for  $35  or  $40.  In  the  counties  lying  adjacent  to  Middle 
Kentucky  small  improved  farms  of  reasonably  good  soil  can  be  had  at  trivial 
prices. 


TENNESSEE,  KENTUCKY,  and  the  REGION  DRAINED  BY  THE  OHIO  RIVER. 


LXXXL 


NASHVILLE     AND     MIDDLE     TENNESSEE. 


WHEN  I  first  saw  Nashville,  the  capital  of  Tennessee,  its  streets  were 
almost  deserted.  The  only  signs  of  activity  were  at  the  railway  stations, 
where  thousands  of  people  were  crowding  the  trains  which  were  to  bear  them 
beyond  the  reach  of  cholera.  The  city  received  a  dreadful  visitation  of  this 
destroyer  in  1873,  and  the  dispatches  which  brought  from  Memphis  the  accounts 
of  the  horrors  of  the  yellow  fever  were  the  only  news  which  I  found  in  the 
papers  of  Nashville.  But  visiting  the  pleasant  town  a  few  months  afterward, 
when    the    cholera  had    passed    away,    and  the  inhabitants  had  regained  their 

courage,  I  saw  plenty  of  life,  activity, 
and  industry.  During  my  stay  the 
city  was  visited  by  a  furious  and  pro- 
tracted rain-storm  which  flooded  the 
lower  part  of  the  town,  and  raised  the 
Cumberland  river,  which  at  Nashville 
flows  between  high  banks,  so  that  a 
disastrous  inundation  was  feared. 
Houses  were  set  afloat,  negroes  were 
driven  from  their  cabins  to  the  streets, 
and  poverty  and  distress  were  great. 

Nashville  was  once  one  of  the  most 
famous  towns  in  the  United  States. 
Its  men  and  women  were  noted  for  their 
wit  and  beauty, — qualities  which  are 
conspicuous  to-day,  but  which  have  not 
been  so  prominent  in  the  society  of  the 
The  town  is  situated  on  the  left  bank  of  the 
It  is  founded  almost 


The  Tennessee  State  Capitol,  at  Nashville. 


National  Capital  as  previous  to  1835 

Cumberland  river,  a  little  north  of  the  centre  of  the  State. 

literally  upon  a  rock,  the  river-bluffs  rising  nearly  eighty  feet  above  low  water 

mark.    The  city  stretches  along  irregular  and  gradual  slopes,  and  is  picturesquely 

grouped  around  Capitol  Hill,  on  which  stands  the  State- House,  one  of  the  most 

elegant  public  buildings  in  the  country.     From  its  beautiful  porticoes  one  may 

look  over  the  wide  expanse  of  plain  dotted  with  groups  of  houses ;  over  the  high 

trestle-works  on  which  run  the  railways  leading  toward  Memphis ;  or  may  gaze 

upon  the  winding  Cumberland,  along  whose  banks  the  high  business  blocks  are 

not  ungracefully  packed ;  or  out  to    the  hill  on  which  stand  the  ruins  of  Fort 

Negley,  a  remnant  of  the  fierce  siege  during  the  war. 


NASHVILLE PROXIMITY     TO      COAL-FIELDS. 


727 


The  Capitol  is  built  of  laminated  limestone,  which  softens  by  exposure  to  the 
air,  and  some  of  the  stones  are  already  beginning  to  show  signs  of  exfoliation. 
On  the  streets  near  the  Capitol  I  saw  gangs  of  negro  convicts  from  the  State 
Penitentiary,  which  is  situated  in  the  city,  working  at  street  and  wall  making, 
while  guards  with  cocked  rifles  kept  constant  watch  over  them. 

Nashville  now  has  about  40,000  population,  and  is  rapidly  growing  in  wealth 
and  commercial  importance.  Its  receipts  of  cotton  annually  amount  to  nearly 
100,000  bales ;  it  has  a  large  trade  in  leaf  tobacco,  which  comes  from  the  adjacent 
counties ;  its  provision  trade  is  with  the  far  South,  and  is  very  extensive.  Its 
sales  of  dry  goods  annually  amount  to  about  four  million  dollars.  It  also  deals 
very  extensively  in  liquor.  The  flouring- mills  in  the  city  and  vicinity  manufac- 
ture 450,000  barrels  of  flour  and  1,200,000  barrels  of  meal  annually.  The 
Southerner  has  a  marked  fondness  for'  Tennessee  whiskey,  and  Nashville  sends 
the  favorite  beverage  into  every  Southern  State.  During  the  year  1873  the  sales 
amounted    to    more   than  one    hundred    thousand  barrels.     Nashville   is  also  a 


View  from  the  State  Capitol,  Nashville,  Tennessee. 

central  point  for  drovers,  and  thousands  of  cattle,  sheep,  and  swine  are  yearly 
sent  down  from  the  great  Blue  Grass  region  to  be  marketed  at  the  capital.  The 
whole  trade  of  the  town  amounts  to  more  than  fifty  millions  yearly,  and  this  will 
probably  soon  be  doubled  by  the  rapid  increase  of  the  coal  trade  and  manu- 
facturing and  mechanical  interests. 

Three  coal-fields  are  easily  accessible  from  the  town.  One  lies  along  the 
Nashville  and  Chattanooga  railroad,  the  second  is  drained  by  the  upper  Cumber- 
land river,  and  the  third,  that  of  Western  Kentucky,  is  penetrated  by  the 
St.  Louis  and  South-eastern  railroad.  Six  important  railways  centre  in  Nashville. 
The  Louisville  and  Nashville,  and  Nashville  and  Decatur  roads,  consolidated, 
give  a  route  from  the  Ohio  river  through  the  Tennessee  capital  to  the  junction 
with  the  road  leading,  by  the  Memphis  and  Charleston  line,  to  Memphis.  The 
Nashville  and  Chattanooga  road  runs  through  the  loveliest  mountain  scenery  in 
the  South  to  Chattanooga.     The  Tennessee  and  Pacific  road  extends  to  Lebanon 


728 


CUMBERLAND      RIVER EDGEF  IE  LD  — DAVID  SON      COUNTY. 


in  Tennessee,  and  the  St.  Louis  and  South-eastern  line  gives  a  direct  route  via 
Henderson,  Kentucky,  and  Evansville,  Indiana,  to  St.  Louis.  Other  roads  are 
now  under  contract,  and  are  opening  up  the  entire  country  of  Middle  Tennessee. 
The  Cumberland  river,  upon  whose  banks  are  many  flourishing  towns,  is 
navigable  for  nine  months  in  the  year,  and  large  quantities  of  coal  and  lumber 
are  floated  down  to  Nashville  during  high  water.  The  value  of  the  exports  and 
imports  along  this  river  exceeds  ten  million  dollars  yearly,  and  if  the  improve- 
ments could  be  effected  which  are  needed  to  render  it  thoroughly  navigable,  even 
at  an  expense  of  four  or  five  million  dollars,  the  trade  would  doubtless  be 
quadrupled.  Little  has  been  done  since  Andrew  Jackson's  time  to  construct  the 
necessary  dams  and  deepen  the  channel  of  the  stream. 

In  North  Nashville  stands  one  of  the.  largest  cotton  factories  in  the  country. 
Although  it  has  been  established  but  a  short  time,  the  annual  dividends  of  the 
company  amount  to  twelve  per  cent.  Factory-hands  receive  but  little  more 
than  five  dollars  weekly,  and  the  cheapness  of  cotton  and  labor  enabled  the 
proprietors  last  year  not  only  to  issue  bonds  which  are  at  par  in  financial 
circles,  but  to  declare  a  net  profit  of  more  than  forty  thousand  dollars.  Nashville 
is  making  an  effort  to  secure  the  establishment  of  other  cotton  factories  within 
her  limits. 

At  Edgefield,  across  the  Cumberland,  there  are  many  prosperous  manufac- 
tories ;  and  many  Nashville  people,  finding  that  the  neighboring  town  has  thus  far 
enjoyed  complete  immunity  from  cholera,  have  built  handsome   residences  there. 

The  Nashville    people,  during  the  visi- 
tation of  their  town  by  the  plague,  ac- 
cepted the  suggestion    that  Edgefield 
escaped  the  scourge  because  its  inhab- 
itants drank  only  cistern   water;  but 
this  cannot  be  the  case,  as  the  water 
procured  for   Nashville   by   her  fine 
system  of  water -works    can    hardly 
be  inferior  to  that  used  in   Edgefield. 
Davidson    county,   in    which    the 
capital    is    situated,  is    highly   pros- 
perous.    Manufacturing  establish- 
ments   are    springing    up    in    many 
towns ;  food  can  be  produced  cheaply, 
and  great  quantities  of  coal  and  iron 
lie   within   convenient  distances  of 
each    other.     The    public    schools  in 
Nashville    are    exceedingly    good. 
More  than  2,500  children   regularly 
attend  them,  and  the  course  of  study,  which  requires  ten  years,  and  embraces 
primary,   intermediate,    grammar    and    high    school    departments,   is    admirably 
comprehensive.     Nashville   is  likely  to  become  a  'prominent  educational  centre 
in  the  South.     The  Vanderbilt  University,  the  outgrowth  of  the   magnificent 


Tomb  of  Ex -President  Polk  —  Nashville,  Tennessee. 


PANORAMA     OF     NASHVILLE STATISTICS, 


729 


The  Hermitage  —  General  Andrew  Jackson's  old  homestead, 
near  Nashville,  Tennessee. 


donation  of  half  a  million  of  dollars  to  the  Methodist  Episcopal  Church  South, 
by  Commodore  Vanderbilt,  of  New  York,  is  in  process  of  erection.  The  Fisk 
University,  for  the  colored  people,  and  several  excellent  seminaries  for  young 
ladies,  have  an  enviable  reputation.  The  University  of  Nashville,  whose  buildings 
were  used  as  a  hospital  during  the  civil 
war,  has  been  revived,  and  its  literary 
and  medical  departments  are  now 
successfully  conducted. 

From  the  suspension  bridge  span- 
ning the  Cumberland  one  gets  a  view 
of  the  pretty  stream,  with  rafts  of  logs 
moored  along  its  banks ;  of  busy  and 
prosperous  Edgefield;  of  old  Fort 
Negley's  wind-swept  height,  and  the 
many  elegant  streets  along  the  hills, 
with  cozy  mansions  and  fine  churches 
embowered  in  foliage.  The  market 
square  is  large,  but  there  is  not  much 
of  the  picturesque  activity  which  one 
finds  in  the  markets  further  South ;  so, 
also,  there  is  less  of  the  lounging  and 
laziness  which  a  more  genial  sun 
prompts  in  the  Gulf  States.  The  town  is  quiet,  but  not  sleepy.  The  numerous 
daily  newspapers,  and  the  elegant  book  stores,  than  which  there  are  no  finer 
south  of  Baltimore,  as  well  as  a  good  public  library,  and  the  collection  of  volumes 
at  the  Capitol,  testify  to  a  literary  taste.  The  society  is  exceedingly  cordial, 
and  hospitality  is  of  the  genuine  Southern  kind,  diffuse  and  deferential. 

A  few  miles  from  the  town,  on  the  line  of  the  Louisville  and  Nashville 
railroad,  is  a  large  national  cemetery,  an  effective  testimonial  to  the  sharpness  of 
the  fighting  around  Nashville  in  1864,  when  General  Thomas  sallied  out  to  meet 
Hood,  and  in  a  two  days'  battle  drove  the  Confederates  from  their  intrenchments, 
following  them  until  they  escaped  across  the  Tennessee  river. 

No  State  is  making  more  earnest  endeavors  to  secure  immigration  than 
Tennessee.  In  the  cars,  on  the  steamboats,  on  the  rivers,  in  the  hotels,  at  the 
Capitol,  in  all  public  places,  one  hears  the  resources  of  the  State  earnestly 
discussed,  and  no  stranger  is  allowed  to  pass  without  giving  him  thorough 
information  as  to  its  splendid  mineral  wealth  and  remarkable  agricultural 
facilities. 

The  population  of  the  State  is  at  present  1,258,526,  of  whom  322,000  are 
colored.  Over  seventy-two  per  cent,  of  the  people  are  engaged  in  agriculture. 
The  area  of  improved  land  in  the  State  is  but  small,  when  one  considers  that 
there  are  twenty-five  millions  of  acres  within  the  State  limits. 

The  tendency  is  to  small  farms.  The  entire  value  of  the  farms  is  more  than 
$218,000,000.  The  total-  valuation  of  the  taxable  property  in  1873  was 
$308,000,000,  while  the  true  valuation  was  probably  two-fifths    more.      From 


73Q 


CHEAPNESS      OF      TENNESSEE      LANDS  —  IMMIGRATION. 


these  few  statistics  it  will  be  seen  that  Tennessee  has  an  industrious  and 
capable  population,  although  in  some  parts  of  the  State  one  cannot  but  look 
with  displeasure  upon  the  rough-riding,  hard-drinking,  quarrelsome  folk  who 
grumble  at  the  new  order  of  things,  and  spend  their  nights  at  corner-groceries, 
inveighing  against  "free  niggers"  and  free  schools. 

The  astonishing  cheapness  of  land  is  accounted  for  by  the  want  of  home 
markets,  of  good  roads,  and  cheap  means  of  transportation  in  many  sec- 
tions in  the  State.  The  war  also  ruined  many  farmers  who  held  slaves,  and 
instances  have  been  known  of  the  sale  of  estates  worth  $100,000  for  one-fifth  of 
that  sum.  Among  the  other  drawbacks  to  farming  are  the  want  of  active  capital 
and  of  good  labor.  Great  inducements  are  offered  immigrants  who  are  willing 
to  work,  and  who  have  a  small  capital  to  invest;  for  good  lands,  partially 
improved,  may  be  had  in  the  eastern,  middle,  or  western  divisions  of  the  State 
for  from  eight  to  thirty  dollars  an  acre. 

Many  Northern  immigrants  who  have  entered  Tennessee  have  been  disap- 
pointed because  they  expected  to  find  labor  less  necessary  than  in  the  country 

whence  they  came.  The  winters  are 
short  and  the  products  are  abundant; 
but  a  farmer  must  labor  in  Tennessee 
as  in  New  York  or  Ohio.  The  Secre- 
tary of  the  State  Board  of  Agriculture, 
Mr.  J.  B.  Killebrew,  who  has  written  an 
excellent  book  on  the  resources  of  the 
State,  urges  immigrants  to  go  toTennes- 
see  in  colonies,  as  they  can  generally, 
by  buying  land  together,  secure  it  at 
much  cheaper  rates,  and  can  have  a 
society  of  their  own,  whereas  a  single 
individual  settling  in  the  back-country 
of  Tennessee,  among  populations  some- 
what ignorant,  and  generally  prejudiced 
against  innovations,  would  find  his 
habits  constantly  clashing  with  those 
of  the  people  around  him,  and  would 
end  by  leaving  in  disgust.  The 
impression  that  the  better  class  in 
Tennessee  does  not  respect  laboring 
men  is  incorrect.  It  is  becoming 
yearly  more  and  more  disgraceful  to  be  an  idler,  and  the  influential  people 
heartily  welcome  all  who  go  to  the  State  for  the  purpose  of  establishing  manu- 
factures or  engaging  in  agriculture.  Outrages  against  persons  and  property  are, 
on  the  whole,  rare.  In  the  rougher  mountain  regions,  and  some  of  the  sections 
bordering  on  the  Mississippi,  strangers  are  looked  upon  with  suspicion,  and 
Northern  men  are  considered  as  natural  enemies ;  but  this  by  no  means 
represents  the  feeling  of  the  mass  of  the  people  of  the  State. 


Young  Tenncsseans. 


INDEBTEDNESS PUBLIC      SCHOOLS. 


71* 


Tennessee  Log  Cabins. 


Tennessee  is  gradually  reducing  her  debt,  which,  in  April  of  1874,  was 
$23,995,337.  In  1875,  nearly  every  railroad  within  her  boundaries  will  be 
liable  to  taxation,  and,  judging  from  the  present  aspects,  many  millions  of 
dollars  will  be  invested  in  the  manufacture  of  cotton  and  woolen  goods,  and  the 
development  of  the  coal  and  iron-fields 

so  prodigally  scattered  over  the  State.  i4r*_-a  ajjlL 

The  Tennessee,  the  Cumberland,  and 
numerous  other  rivers,  serve  as 
important  avenues  of  transportation, 
and  the  unflagging  zeal  manifested  by 
the  State  authorities  in  demanding  the 
improvement  of  these  streams  will 
soon  result  in  some  action  by  the 
General  Government.  Western  Ten- 
nessee has  already  more  than  seven 
hundred  miles  of  rail,  and  had  it  not 
been  for  the  financial  crisis  of  'y^, 
the  mileage  would  have  been  largely 
increased. 

The  public  school  system  is  not  yet  very  efficient,  although  much  labor  has 
been  expended  in  its  enforcement  by  native  Tennesseans.  There  is  a  positive 
objection  freely  expressed  in  many  parts  of  Tennessee  to  the  education  of  the 
negro,  but  the  colored  element  in  the  Republican  party  seems  quite  competent 
to  assert  its  own  interests  and  to  provide  for  them.  The  blacks  are  clamorous 
for  many  of  the  privileges  which  would  be  secured  to  them  by  the  Civil  Rights 
bill,  and  Congressman  Maynard,  their  present  candidate  for  Governor  (October, 
1874),  is  helping  them  in  their  crusade.  The  permanent  school  fund  for  the 
State  is  more  than  two  and  one-half  millions,  and  an  additional  annual  income 
is  derived  from  numerous  sources.  The  school  districts  are  authorized  to  levy 
taxes  for  the  support  of  schools  and  the  erection  of  buildings.  As  the  matter 
of  taxation  is  left  to  their  option,  the  more  illiberal  of  the  districts  are,  of  course, 
unprovided  with  schools.  It  is  asserted  that  but  thirty-five  counties  in  the  State 
have  really  levied  a  tax  for  school  purposes.  The  fact  that  the  whites  are 
positively  determined  to  provide  completely  separate  schools  for  the  colored 
people,  and  that  the  latter  are  not  rich  enough  to  supply  themselves  with 
schools,  renders  the  subject  a  difficult  and  disagreeable  one,  especially  at  the 
present  time.  The  scholastic  population  of  the  State  was,  in  1873,  one  hundred 
and  seventy-three  thousand.  The  number  of  teachers  is  insufficient,  and  their 
qualifications  are  not  always  of  a  high  order. 

The  Cumberland  University  at  Lebanon  has  a  good  legal  department,  and 
the  Presbyterians  propose  shortly  to  establish  a  fine  University,  with  an  endow- 
ment of  half  a  million,  which  shall  rival  the  famous  institution  founded  by 
Vanderbilt  at  Nashville. 

Middle  Tennessee,  in  which  Nashville  stands,  is  at  present  the  most  valuable 
division  of  the  State.      It  contains  more  than  half  a  million  people,  and  several 
47 


732 


THE     CENTRAL     BASIN      OF      MIDDLE      TENNESSEE. 


hundred  prosperous  towns  and  villages.  It  is  one  of  the  healthiest  sections  of 
America.  The  Cumberland,  Duck,  and  Elk  rivers  flow  down  through  deep 
gorges  in  the  mountains,  and  the  hundreds  of  small  streams  in  the  recesses 
among  the  hills  furnish  abundant  water  power.  The  variety  of  crops  is  almost 
astonishing;  wheat  and  fruits,  tobacco,  corn,  cotton,  and  everything  that  grows 
above  the  thirty-fifth  parallel  of  latitude, — even  the  fig  and  the  magnolia, — 
can  be  cultivated  without  injury  from  the  climate.  In  what  is  called  the  Central 
Basin  of  Middle  Tennessee,  as  in  Kentucky,  much  of  the  fine  stock  used  in  the 
Cotton  States  is  bred.  The  fleet  horses  and  the  slow  and  laborious  mules,  the 
fine  short-horned  and  Ayrshire  cattle,  are  sought  by  buyers  from  all  the  States 
as  the  most  perfect  types  of  these  animals.  As  a  wool-growing  region  the  basin 
has  few  equals  and  no  superiors. 


Tomb  of  Andrew  Jackson,  at  the  "Hermitage,"  near  Nashville. 


LXXXII. 

A     GLANCE     AT     MARYLAND'S     HISTORY  —  HER     EXTENT     AND 

RESOURCES. 


WHEN  the  first  Lord  Baltimore,  George  Calvert,  found  that  his  efforts  to 
establish  a  colony  in  Newfoundland  were  unavailing,  he  visited  Virginia, 
in  1628.  While  there,  he  undertook  the  examination  of  the  Chesapeake,  which 
John  Smith  had  explored  many  years  before.      Journeying  along  the    mighty 


stretch  of  water  200  miles  from  the  ocean,  and, 
noting  its  numerous  tributary  rivers,  he  doubt- 
less saw  the  wonderful  advantages  which  these 
offered  for  colonization,  and  as  soon  as  he 
returned  to  England  he  procured  from  Charles  I. 
the  promise  of  a  grant  of  territory  on  the  Chesapeake.  The  Virginians  were  not 
pleased  with  the  prospects  of  the  establishment  of  Lord  Baltimore's  colony,  and 
took  occasion  to  voice  their  discontent  in  the  hearing  of  the  English  officials. 
Lord  Baltimore  died  early  in  1632,  before  the  promised  charter  had  been 
accorded ;  but  when  it  was  issued  it  passed  to  his  son,  the  second  Lord  Baltimore, 


734  STATE      LINES     DISPUTED RELIGIOUS     TOLERATION. 

and  "all  that  part  of  the  peninsula  lying  in  the  parts  of  America  between  the 
ocean  on  the  east  and  the  Bay  of  Chesapeake  on  the  west"  was  erected  into  a 
province  and  called  Maryland.  This  was  England's  first  province,  and  it  was 
intended  to  call  it  Crescentia ;  but  Charles  I.,  when  the  charter  was  presented  for 
his  signature,  struck  out  Crescentia  and  substituted  Maryland,  in  honor  of  his 
queen,  Henrietta  Maria,  of  France.  Lord  Baltimore  was  made  absolute  lord  and 
proprietary  of  the  province,  giving  only  two  Indian  arrows  annually,  and  one- 
fifth  of  all  the  gold  and  silver  ore  found  within  the  limits  of  Maryland,  as  a 
pledge  of  his  allegiance  to  the  crown.  The  proprietary  was  accorded  power 
to  enact  laws,  with  the  advice  and  assent  of  the  freemen  of  the  province  and 
their  delegates.  He  had  arbitrary  power  to  impose  taxes,  and  to  deprive 
citizens  even   of  life  and  liberty. 

The  boundaries  of  Maryland  were  the  occasion  of  much  dispute  in  later  days, 
the  present  limits  being  much  less  than  those  originally  accorded  the  province. 
Delaware  was  formerly  part  of  the  territory  of  Maryland.  The  boundary  between 
Maryland  and  Pennsylvania  was  disputed  until  Mason  and  Dixon  drew  their 
famous  line  between  the  two  States  in  1763 — since  recognized  as  the  dividing  line 
between  Northern  and  Southern  territory  and  sentiment.  Virginia  also  revived 
her  old  quarrel  with  regard  to  the  boundaries,  and  it  may  be  said  to  have  existed 
in  a  modified  form  up  to  the  present  day. 

In  1633,  on  the  22d  of  November,  about  two  hundred  colonists,  many  of 
whom  were  Roman  Catholics,  set  sail  from  the  Isle  of  Wight,  arriving  off  Point 
Comfort  in  Virginia  early  in  1634.  On  the  25th  of  March  they  celebrated  mass 
on  the  banks  of  the  Potomac  and  took  formal  possession  of  the  country.  They 
then  occupied  an  Indian  town  which  the  natives  had  ceded  to  them,  named  St. 
Mary's,  and  for  more  than  half  a  century  this  town  was  the  capital  of  the 
province.  The  capital  thus  established  was  almost  at  the  southern  extremity  of 
the  province,  and  for  many  years  thereafter  the  extension  of  settlements  into  the 
interior  was  hindered  by  internal  commotion  and  wars  with  the  Indians.  The 
proprietary  government  during  the  first  century  of  its  existence  twice  met  with 
serious  interruptions :  once  when  it  was  usurped  by  Cromwell's  Commissioners 
during  the  rule  of  the  English  Commonwealth,  and  once  when  it  was  displaced  by 
the  rule  of  William  and  Mary.  At  a  time  when  religious  toleration  was  unknown 
elsewhere  in  America,  or  at  all  in  Europe,  it  was  inaugurated  under  the 
proprietary  government.  Maryland  soon  became  a  refuge  for  all  who  suffered 
from  religious  persecution.  Quakers  and  Puritans  and  members  of  the  Church 
of  England  fled  thither  from  New  England  and  Virginia,  and  Protestants  from 
France,  Portugal,  and  the  Netherlands,  took  refuge  in  Lord  Baltimore's  colony 
from  Catholic  rage.  The  population  of  the  province  enjoyed  religious  equality 
until  1692,  when  the  royal  government  which  had  usurped  the  powers 
of  the  proprietary,  made,  for  the  first  time,  ecclesiastical  establishment  in 
Maryland. 

In  1659  Baltimore  county  was  created.  At  that  time  the  territory  was  almost 
a  wilderness  occupied  by  the  Indians,  but  the  colonists  gradually  extended  the 
limits  of  civilization. 


FOUNDATION  AND   EARLY  GROWTH, 


735 


In  1662  the  first  land  within  the  limits  of  the  present  Baltimore  city  was 
patented  by  Thomas  Gorsuch,  a  member  of  the  Society  of  Friends.  This  was  a 
tract  of  fifty  acres  on  Whetstone  Point,  where  to-day  the  gigantic  grain  trade  of 
the  West  is  centring.  The  first  actual  settler  on  the  site  of  the  city  is  believed 
to  have  been  a  Mr.  David  Jones,  who  gave  his  name  to  the  erratic  little  stream 
known  as  Jones's  Falls,  which  has  often  overflowed  its  banks  and  caused  serious 
damage. 

In  1723  ships  began  to  enter  the  Patapsco  from  London,  and  in  1729  an 
Act  of  Assembly  was  passed  for  erecting  a  town  on  the  north  side  of  the 
Patapsco,  in  Baltimore  county.  In  1730  the  town  was  laid  out  into  lots,  and 
called  Baltimore  in  compliment  to  the  proprietary.  It  was  evidently  not  the 
expectation  of  the  early  settlers  that  the  town  would  grow  to  its  present  size, 
or  they  would  not  have  established  it  in  a  location  surrounded  by  hills,  water- 
courses and  marshes  ;  but  they  found  abundance  of  stone,  lime,  iron  and  timber, 
and  excellent  sites  for  water- works  near  the  harbor.  The  expense  to  which 
the  modern  Baltimoreans  have  been  subjected  for  extending  and  grading 
streets  along  the  numerous  hills,  and  for  covering  marshes  and  small  streams, 
is    enormous. 

In  1752  Baltimore  had  but  twenty-five  houses.  St.  Paul's  Church,  which 
was  begun  by  the  members  of  the  Church  of  England  in  173 1  and  completed 
in  1744,  was  a  quaint  building  occupying  the  site  of  the  present  church,  at 
the  corner  of  Charles  and  Saratoga  streets.  Although  the  population  of  the 
county  at  that  time  was  more  than  seventeen  thousand,  that  of  the  town  was 
but  two  hundred.  The  sloop  "  Baltimore  "  and  the  brig  "  Philip  and  Charles  " 
were  the  only  sea- going  vessels  owned  in  the  town.  The  warehouse  near  the 
harbor,    for    tobacco    inspection,    was 


one  of  the  principal  centres  of  trade. 
The  growth  of  the  city  was  promoted 
during  the  war  between  the  English 
and  the  French  by  the  necessity 
which  the  inhabitants  felt  of  flocking 
together  for  protection,  rather  than 
penetrating  into  the  country. 

In  1755  the  Indians  came  within 
eighty  miles  of  Baltimore,  and  made 
numerous  destructive  raids.  Palisades 
were  constructed,  and  the  women 
and  children  were  placed  by  the 
colonists  upon  vessels  in  the  harbor. 
In  1756  numerous  Acadians,  refugees 
from  the  harsh  policy  of  the  English 
in  Nova  Scotia,  settled  in  Baltimore. 
The    town    began  to   grow    in  com- 


The  Oldest  House  in  Baltimore. 


merce ;  ship-yards  were  established  at  Fells  Point,  and   many   merchants  had 
their  residences  there.       In  1761  the  population  of  the  province  was  164,007,  of 


736  Maryland's    share    in    the    Devolution. 

which  49,675  were  negroes.  The  good  people  of  Maryland  were  greatly 
annoyed  at  this  time  by  the  number  of  convicts  imported  from  England, 
estimated  at  not  less  than  twenty  thousand.  These  convicts  were  brought  over 
under  contract  by  private  shippers,  and  sold  into  servitude  for  the  entire  term 
of  transportation.  In  due  time  many  of  them  were  transformed  into  useful 
citizens,  and  some  of  them  attained  considerable  distinction. 

In  1 76 1  the  Maryland  exports  of  tobacco  to  England  amounted  to  140,000 
pounds.  Wheat,  lumber,  corn,  flour,  iron,  skins,  and  furs  were  also  exported, 
and  Maryland  would  have  grown  with  astonishing  rapidity  from  that  date  if 
England's  policy  of  stifling  manufacturing  industry  in  the  colonies,  that  she 
might  send  her  own  productions  to  them,  had  not  been  vigorously  carried  out. 
The  iron  and  shipping  business  was  greatly  restricted,  but,  although  commer- 
cially dependent  upon  England,  the  province  managed  to  develop  her  natural 
resources  to  a  considerable  extent.  Although  Maryland  acquiesced  in  the 
restrictions  made  by  England  upon  her  commerce,  she  heartily  joined  with  the 
colonies  in  asserting  the  right  to  regulate  her  own  internal  government  and 
to  impose  her  own  taxes.  The  freemen  of  the  province  were  exceedingly 
jealous  of  the  privileges  accorded  to  them  by  "the  charter,  and  when  England 
began  to  take  the  matter  of  taxation  into  her  own  hands  by  establishing  the 
stamp  tax,  Maryland  promptly  expelled  the  stamp  distributor  from  the  province 
upon  his  arrival,  and  forbade  the  landing  of  the  stamped  paper  which  had 
been  brought  in  the  same  ship  with  him.  The  attempted  tax  upon  tea,  which 
was  the  occasion  of  the  sudden  rebellion  in  Boston,  was  also  the  occasion  of  an 
outbreak  at  Annapolis,  the  then  capital  of  Maryland.  The  colonists  had  refused 
from  the  very  first  to  allow  the  tea  sent  from  England  to  be  unloaded,  and 
in  1774  a  vessel  with  eighteen  packages  of  tea  on  board  was  burned  at 
Annapolis. 

At  the  time  of  the  declaration  of  independence  by  the  Continental  Congress 
in  Philadelphia,  the  proprietary  government  of  Maryland  was  held  by  an 
illegitimate  son  of  Lord  Baltimore,  who  died  in  1771.  The  people  of  Maryland 
had  always  entertained  a  strong  loyalty  toward  the  Baltimores,  but  this 
bastard  ruler  was  promptly  objected  to.  His  government  was  overthrown, 
and  a  convention  was  called  to  frame  a  Constitution  for  the  new  State  of 
Maryland. 

The  convention  assembled  at  Annapolis  on  the  14th  of  August,  1776,  and 
Maryland  entered  into  the  Revolutionary  war  with  an  earnestness  and  gallantry 
which  made  the  name  of  the  "  Maryland  line"  conspicuous  in  Revolutionary 
annals.  At  the  battle  of  Brooklyn  Heights  in  1776  a  part  of  a  battalion  of 
Maryland  troops  repeatedly  charged  with  bayonets  a  whole  brigade  of  British 
regulars.  They  were  the  first  American  troops  to  use  that  weapon,  and  used  it 
to  such  advantage  that  on  many  occasions  thereafter  they  both  charged  and 
repulsed  the  enemy  with  unloaded  muskets.  Maryland  also  maintained  a  marine 
service  during  the  Revolution,  to  protect  her  shores  from  the  English  cruisers. 

After  the  establishment  of  the  independence  of  the  colonies  there  was  for 
some  time  an  almost  complete  paralysis  of  commerce  in  Maryland.     The  low 


THE     ATTACK     UPON      FORT     MCHENRY.  737 

price  of  tobacco  and  flour,  the  principal  articles  of  export  from  the  State,  added 
to  the  distress.  But  a  period  of  marked  commercial  activity  soon  followed. 
The  tobacco  trade  revived,  English  merchants  who  had  sought  to  re-establish 
the  agencies  which  they  had  maintained  before  the  Revolution  at  Annapolis, 
Bladensburg,  Upper  Marlborough  and  Elk  Ridge  Landing,  being  superseded  by 
Baltimore  capitalists,  who  began  to  make  shipments  in  their  own  vessels  and  for 
their  own  account.  The  trade  of  the  city  was  greatly  improved;  canal  companies 
along  the  Susquehanna  and  the  Potomac  were  formed ;  streets  were  extended  and 
paved;  and  the  population,  which  in  1782  was  nearly  8,000,  became  energetic 
and  progressive.  Sugar  refineries,  glass-works  and  flour-mills  were  established, 
and  the  Baltimore  clippers  carrying  their  products  to  foreign  ports  became 
famous  everywhere.  As  the  West  began  to  develop,  Baltimore  laid  hold  from 
time  to  time  upon  its  trade,  and  became  the  first,  as  it  is  to-day  the  natural, 
market  for  the  productions  of  that  section. 

Baltimore  bore  an  important  part  in  the  war  between  England  and  America 
in  1 814,  and  was  one  of  the  chief  sufferers  by  it.  The  British  fleet  blockaded  the 
Chesapeake  bay,  and  commerce  was  seriously  affected.  Many  privateers  were 
fitted  out  at  Baltimore  and  did  good  service.  After  the  burning  of  Washington 
by  the  British,  a  force  of  5,000  English  was  landed  at  the  mouth  of  the  Patapsco 
river,  a  sharp  battle  taking  place  there  between  this  force  and  the  Maryland 
and  Pennsylvania  militia.  On  the  13th  of  September,  18 14,  the  British  made  a 
vigorous  attack  upon  Fort  McHenry,  an  important  fortification  which  had  been 
established  on  Whetstone  Point  in  1794.  The  little  fort,  with  its  finely  planned 
batteries,  completely  repulsed  the  attacking  fleet,  and  compelled  the  retreat  of  the 
invading  forces.  During  the  night  of  the  bombardment,  upon  which  the  English 
admiral  relied  so  much  that  he  had  sworn  to  take  the  fort  in  two  hours,  Francis 
S.  Key,  a  noted  Marylander  and  a  prisoner  in  the  British  fleet,  wrote  the 
celebrated  national  song  called  "The  Star-Spangled  Banner." 

This  song,  which  has  justly  been  accorded  the  honors  of  the  "  national 
hymn,"  was  suggested  by  the  hopes  and  fears  which  filled  the  poet's  heart  during 
the  long  and  terrible  night,  and  the  anxiety  with  which  he  looked  at  the  walls  of 
the  fort  in  the  morning  to  see  if  the  flag  was  still  there : — 

"  Oh,  say  can  you  see  by  the  dawn's  early  light 

What  so  proudly  we  hailed  at  the  twilight's  last  gleaming ; 
Whose  broad  stripes  and  bright  stars,  through  the  perilous  fight 

O'er  the  ramparts  we  watched,    were  so  gallantly  streaming? 
The  rockets'  red  glare,  bombs  bursting  in  air, 

Gave  proof  through  the  night  that  our  flag  was  still  there. 
Oh,  say  does  that  star-spangled  banner  still  wave 

O'er  the  land  of  the  free  and  the  home  of  the  brave?" 

While  the  bombs  of  the  English  ships  were  bursting  in  hundreds  about  the 
parapets  of  Fort  McHenry,  an  adventurous  rooster  mounted  the  walls  and  crowed 
heartily  and  repeatedly.  One  of  the  defenders  of  the  fort  then  declared  that  if 
he  ever  lived  to  see  Baltimore  the  rooster  should  be  fed  with  pound  cake  ;  and  the 
day  after  the  bombardment,  although  the  man  was  so  worn  down  with  fatigue  as 


73S 


THE   ABUNDANT   WATER  COMMUNICATION. 


to  be  unaole  to  leave  the  fort,  he  sent  to  the  city,  procured  the  cake,  and  treated 
the    patriotic    fowl. 

Maryland  has  an  area  of  about  9,500  square  miles  of  land,  and  the  Chesa 
peake  bay  covers  4,000  more.  It  may  be  said  with  truth  that  the  land 
beneath  the  waters  is  quite  as  productive  as  that  above,  for  the  oyster-beds  the 
abundance  of  excellent  fish,  the  flocks  of  wild  ducks  and  the  multitudes  of 
terrapins  and  crabs  afford  an  immense  commerce.  The  thousands  of  acres  along- 
the  shores  of  this  beautiful  bay  are  crowded  with  market  gardens,  which  supply 
Baltimore,  Philadelphia,  Washington,  and  New  York  with  all  the  most  delicate 
fruits  and  vegetables. 

The  estuaries  and  navigable  arms  of  the  Chesapeake  are  so  numerous  that 
there  are  many  counties  bordering  op  the  water,  no  point  in  which  is  many  miles 
from  a  good  landing.  Although  the  actual  sea-coast  of  Maryland  is  but  little 
more  than  thirty  miles,  the  tide-water  margin,  including  that  along  the  islands  is 
over  500  miles.  The  largest  vessels  can  ascend  the  bay,  pass  St.  Mary's,  Calvert 
and  Anne  Arundel  counties  to  Annapolis,  and,  entering  the  Potomac  river  can 


Fort  McHenry  — Baltimore  Harbor.     [Page  737.] 


pass  up  by  St.  Mary  s  Charles,  and  Prince  George's  counties  to  Washington 
The  Chesapeake,  the  t^anticoke  and  the  Patuxent,  as  well  as  nearly  fifty  other 
streams,  are  navigable  for  many  miles.  Maryland  is  divided  into  three  sections 
wo  of  wh.ch,  separated  by  the  Chesapeake,  are  very  similar  in  formation.  In 
the  tme-wate, rd.str.ct,  wh.cn  embraces  nearly  one-half  of  the  territory  of  the 
State    and  wh.ch  ,s  supposed  to  have  formed  the  bed  of  an  ancient  ocean    lie 

2  seS  the?"  rd  ^f  Iime'     The  -^  1S  bUt  «  elated  abo 
the  sea  and  the  forest-growths  are  mainly  oak,  hickory,  chestnut,  walnut,  gum 

g S  r  did  b,  t  T'  b,°g  !r°n  °re'  ka°lin'  °r  P°rCe,afa  d"d 
gray   red  and  blue  clays  are  found  in  profusion.      In  this  section  there  is  an 

excefteut  opportunity  for  the  establishment  of  glass  manufactories,  as  Z  pure 
sand  ,s  adm.rably  adapted  for  that  purpose.  Wheat,  Indian  corn,  tobacco  and 
cotton  ,n  the  southern  sections,  are  the  grains  mainly  cultivated 

On  the  "eastern  shore,"  which  embraces  the  counties  of  Worcester    Som 
erset,  Dorchester,    Talbot,  Caroline,    Queen  Anne's   and  Cecil,   the   soi I  Zl 
or.gmally  among  the  most  fertile  in  the  State.     Reckless  management^  ZZ 
holdmg  rimes  .mured  their  productive  value,  but  careful  culture  is  gradually 


THE     EASTERN      SHORE ITS      RESOURCES.  739 

restoring  them.  The  sections  remote  from  tide-water  produce  wheat  and  corn 
mainly,  while  in  the  southern  portion  flax  and  cotton  are  raised.  In  Worcester 
county  there  are  immense  cypress  swamps,  but  the  soil,  in  many  portions,  where 
it  has  been  drained  and  reclaimed,  is  of  unsurpassed  fertility.  Wild  ducks  and 
oysters  abound  along  the  Atlantic  coast  of  this  county. 

The  grape  grows  in  great  perfection  along  the  eastern  shore,  and  in  some 
counties  excellent  wines  are  manufactured.  Along  the  western  shore  dwell 
many  hardy  fishermen,  the  shad  and  herring  fisheries  of  the  Potomac  being  as 
extensive  as  those  of  any  other  portion  of  the  United  States.  As  many  as 
four  hundred  thousand  barrels  of  herring  have  been  taken  from  the  Potomac, 
within  a  hundred  miles  of  Washington,  in  a  single  year,  and  sent  to  the 
Baltimore  market.  On  this,  as  on  the  eastern  shore,  the  lands  suffered  for  a  cen- 
tury from  an  exhaustive  system  of  planting,  and  being  deserted  by  their  owners, 
as  their  fertility  gradually  lessened,  the  section  had  a  smaller  white  population  in 
i860  than  just  before  the  Revolution;  but  the  means  of  reclaiming  all  the  lands 
exists  in  the  great  beds  of  shell  marl  which  abound  throughout  many  of  the 
counties.  In  the  southern  part  of  the  district  tobacco  is  one  of  the  principal 
crops,  Prince  George's  county  alone  having  produced  as  much  as  ten  million 
pounds  in 'a  year.  The  clay-beds  which  extend  through  the  district  from  the 
Potomac  to  the  Susquehanna,  and  which  here  and  there  attain  an  elevation  of 
two  hundred  feet  above  tide-water,  are  very  valuable.  The  iron  which  the  clay 
contains  gives  the  pottery  made  from  it  a  red  shade,  which  renders  it  unfit  for 
the  choice  wares ;  but  for  the  manufacture  of  brick,  these  clay-beds  are  the  best 
in  the  world.  Prince  George's  county,  whence  in  the  latter  part  of  the  seven- 
teenth century  a  hundred  sail  of  ships  annually  carried  tobacco  to  England  and 
the  West  Indies,  possesses  the  State  Agricultural  College,  which  is  located  near 
Bladensburg.  On  the  southern  border  of  Montgomery  county  are  the  great 
falls  of  the  Potomac,  one  or  the  finest  water  powers  in  the  United  States.  In 
this  county  many  of  the  wealthy  citizens  of  Washington  have  built  handsome 
residences.  The  section  suffered  greatly  from  raids  during  the  war,  but  is  rapidly 
regaining  its  original  prosperity.  On  the  Patapsco  river,  in  Howard  county,  there 
are  numerous  excellent  granite  quarries,  and  in  Baltimore  county  there  are  fine- 
grained white  and  blue-gray  marbles. 

The  mountain  district  of  the  State,  which  includes  Carroll,  Frederick,  Wash- 
ington, and  Alleghany  counties,  is  fertile  and  interspersed  with  beautiful  valleys. 
It  is  admirably  adapted  to  the  raising  of  stock,  and  large  crops  of  wheat  and 
thousands  of  pounds  of  maple  sugar  are  annually  manufactured  there. 

At  Wedverton,  in  Frederick  county,  a  noble  water  power  has  been  made 
available  by  a  dam  across  the  Potomac,  and  here  in  due  time  an  extensive 
manufacturing  town  will  doubtless  spring  up.  In  the  rugged  and  broken 
Alleghany  county  there  are  extensive  glades  or  meadows  whose  grasses  are 
famed  for  their  luxuriance,  and  over  which,  before  the  late  war,  thousands  of 
cattle  from  Virginia  roamed  while  fattening  for  the  stall.  The  iron  ores  of 
Cumberland  and  the  coal  mines  have  already  been  alluded  to.  The  capital 
invested  in  mines  in  Alleghany  county  is  nearly  seven  million  dollars. 


74Q 


CONSEQUENCES     OF     NEGRO     MIGRATION. 


Eighty-five  thousand  slaves  were  emancipated  as  the  result  of  the  war,  and 
these  persons  constituted  the  main  agricultural  laboring  population  of  the  State. 
As  elsewhere  throughout  the  South,  they  have  left  the  country  in  swarms  and 
flocked  to  the  towns,  and  the  owners  of  large  plantations,  finding  that  their 
ex-slaves  have  deserted  them,  are  anxious  to  divide  up  the  broad  tracts  which 
have  now  become  a  burden  to  them  into  small  vendible  portions.  Nowhere 
is  there  a  better  opportunity  for  the  purchase  of  cheap  and  good  lands,  or  for 
the  practice  of  the  highest  scientific  farming. 


Jones's  Falls  —  Baltimore. 


LXXXIII. 


THE  BALTIMORE  AND  OHIO  RAILROAD  —  GROWTH  OF  TRADE. 

BALTIMORE,  the  Maryland  metropolis,  not  only  enjoys  the  honor  of  having- 
received  the  first  telegraphic  message  in  the  United  States,  but  it  was  also 
the  first  to  inaugurate  a  railroad.  To  that  road,  which  has  become  one  of  the 
most  gigantic  powers  in  the  land,  it  owes  much  of  its  present  astonishingly  rapid 
growth.  The  last  surviving  signer  of  the  Declaration  of  Independence,  the 
illustrious  Charles  Carroll,  of  Carroll- 
ton,  laid  the  corner-stone  of  the 
Baltimore  and  Ohio  railroad,  on  the 
4th  of  July,  1828.  Within  half  a 
century  since  the  road  was  projected, 
Baltimore's  population  has  increased 
from  62,000  to  350,000,  and  her  trade 
has  grown  so  enormously  that  the 
stranger  who  visited  the  town  in  1 860 
would  hardly  recognize  it  now. 

When  the  first  rails  were  laid 
down,  there  were  very  few  who  con- 
templated the  completion  of  the  road 
even  to  the  Alleghanies,  and  none 
believed  that  it  would  touch  the  Great 
Lakes  and  make  Chicago  and  Pitts- 
burg its  tributaries.  The  material 
obstacles  which  beset  its  construc- 
tion were  by  no  means  so  great  as  the 
financial  difficulties.  From  1828  until 
January  in  1853,  when  the  completion  of  the  Wheeling  and  Ohio  railroad 
was  celebrated,  the  company  was  engaged  in  perpetual  struggles  to  maintain 
its  existence.  As  soon  as  the  first  rails  were  laid  in  the  city,  in  1828,  a 
car  which  resembled  a  country  market  wagon,  and  which  was  drawn  by  a  single 
horse,  was  placed  upon  them,  and  the  leading  citizens  of  Baltimore  made  trips 
backward  and  forward  in  it.  No  one  had  then  dreamed  of  employing  steam 
to  draw  the  cars ;  but  as  soon  as  steam  was  introduced  in  England,  Mr. 
Peter  Cooper,  of  New  York,  who  had  invented  a  locomotive  with  a  boiler 
about  the  size  of  those  used  in  hotel  kitchens,  forthwith  solicited  the  privi- 
lege of  trying  his  new  and  wondrous  invention  upon  the  Baltimore  and 
Ohio  railroad.      His  was  the  first  locomotive   for   railroad  purposes  ever  built 


Exchange  Place,  Baltimore,  Maryland. 


742 


PETER      COOPER    S      EXPERIMENT. 


in  America,  and  Mr.  Cooper  successfully  drove  his  own  engine,  to  which  was 
attached  a  car  filled  with  the  Directors  and  prominent  citizens,  a  distance  of 
thirteen   miles  on   the  new  road  in  fifty-seven  minutes.      But  as  ill-luck  would 

have  it,  on  the  return  trip,  his  engine 
was  beaten  by  a  smart  trotting- horse, 
whose  owner,  from  the  highway  parallel 
with  the  road,  saw  the  daring  experi- 
menters at  work,  and  mischievously 
resolved  to  test  horse-flesh  against 
steam.  The  veteran  philanthropist, 
Cooper,  must  look  back  upon  those 
days  of  primitive  experiments  with  a 
smile  when  he  remembers  that  from 
•New  York  to  St.  Louis  is  hardly  a 
journey  of  forty-eight  hours  to-day. 

From  such  humble  beginnings  the 
road  rapidly  grew,  and,,  as  it  reached 
the  Alleghanies,  began  to  draw  toward 
Baltimore  a  traffic  in  coal  which  has 
since  been  developed  into  colossal  pro- 

The  Masonic  Temple -Baltimore,  Maryland.  portions.  Millions      of     tons,     in      Cars 

expressly  constructed  for  the  purpose,  annually  pass  over  the  road;  and  the 
traveler  who,  seated  in  the  hotel-station  at  Harper's  Ferry,  looks  down  the 
line  of  rail  which  runs  along  the  ravine, 
sees  immense  trains,  drawn  by 
enormous  engines  of  a  peculiar  build, 
whizzing  over  the  tracks  within  ten 
minutes  of  each  other  all  day  long. 
In  183 1  the  then  President  of  the 
railroad,  in  a  report  made  to  the 
Governor  of  Maryland,  boasted  that 
the  State  had  within  her  limits  the 
longest  continuous  railway  in  the 
world.  This  was  the  road  from 
Baltimore  to  Frederick,  sixty -one 
miles  in  length.  In  the  same  report 
he  foreshadowed  the  future  effort  to 
draw  the  trade  of  the  West  to 
Baltimore,  when  he  referred  to  the 
fact  that  the  State  was  so  situated  as 
to  afford  the  surest  and  most  conve- 
nient route  of  communication  between 
the  navigable  Western  waters  and  the  The  Shot-Towe,-Baltimore.  Marviand. 

ocean.  Baltimore,  with  her  splendid  advantages  of  precedent,  however,  required 
many  severe  lessons  before   she  could  be  made  to  improve  her  opportunities. 


BALTIMORE   SUPPLANTING   NEW  YORK. 


743 


One  by  one  her  rivals  laid  hold  of  the  treasures  of  the  West,  while  the  Directors 
of  the  Baltimore  and  Ohio  railroad  were  battling  with  the  great  canal  company, 
which  had  so  long  monopolized  the  trade  between  the  Chesapeake  and  the  Ohio ; 
and  while  the  legislation  of  Baltimore  itself  so  restricted  the  road  that  it  could  not 
obtain  proper  development.  In  1842  the  line  was  opened  to  Cumberland,  now  a 
fine  commercial  town,  beautifully  located  in  the  mountains ;  and  on  the  comple- 
tion of  the  road  to  Wheeling  in  1854  the  commerce  of  Baltimore  began  to  increase 
with  tremendous  rapidity.  The  freight  to  the  State  in  1832  had  amounted  to 
scarcely  30,000  tons;  in  1852  it  had  reached  252,000  tons;  in  1854  it  amounted 
to  661,000  tons.  All  the  old  methods  of  transportation  were  thenceforth  unavail- 
ing. The  products  of  the  West  were  no  longer  floated  down  the  Ohio  and 
Mississippi  to  New  Orleans,  there  loaded  into  schooners,  and  thence  carried  by 
sea  to  the  Chesapeake,  and  so  to  Baltimore. 

Just  as  the  people  of  the  State  were  beginning  to  despair,  and  to  fancy  that 
New  York  and  Philadelphia  had  completely  distanced  them,  their  best  commer- 
cial development  began.  Had  the 
road  been  completed  to  the  Ohio  river 
twenty  years  sooner,  the  river  system 
of  the  West  would  not  to-day  have 
converged  toward  Lake  Erie.  The 
wisdom  of  the  commercial  men  of  the 
North  who  had  hastened  to  construct 
the  Erie  and  New  York  Central  road, 
which,  with  the  Erie  canal,  seemed  to 
secure  to  New  York  the  great  body  of 
the  Western  trade,  had  been  so  often 
demonstrated  to  the  Baltimoreans  that 
they  had  quite  despaired  of  longer 
endeavoring  to  make  Baltimore  a  rival 
of  New  York,  and  were  contenting 
themselves  with  the  supply  trade  of  the 
South.  But  the  vigorous  policy  of  the 
railroad  men  who  pushed  the  Baltimore 
and  Ohio  road  into  the  West,  and  courageously  combated  New  York,  has  worked 
a  complete  revolution.  Now  that  grain  seeks  quick  transportation  by  rail,  and 
that  the  Baltimore  and  Ohio  road,  whose  connections  extend  through  the  length 
of  the  South  and  West,  has  reached  out  an  arm  to  Chicago,  Baltimore  seems 
likely  to  be  a  most  important  tide-water  terminus  of  the  West. 

The  war  interrupted  the  many  projects  which  President  Garret,  to  whose 
past  and  present  vigorous  management  the  railroad  owes  much  of  its  prosperity, 
had  been  maturing,  and  after  four  years  of  civil  strife  the  work  was  begun  anew\ 
In  1865  the  company  commenced  to  lease  Western  railroads,  and  to  elaborate  its 
terminal  facilities  at  Baltimore.  As  the  result,  it  has  to-day  under  its  manage- 
ment a  continuous  direct  road  of  512  miles  in  length,  furnishing  for  West  Virginia 
and  much  of  Ohio,  Indiana,  Illinois,  Missouri  and  Kansas,  the  surest  and  cheapest 


Scene  on  the  Chesapeake  and  Ohio  Canal. 


744 


CONTEST      FOR     THE      RIGHT     OF     WAY. 


path  to  the  sea.  It  has  thoroughly  attached  itself  to  the  trade  of  the  valley 
of  the  Ohio,  Pittsburg,  Wheeling,  Marietta,  Parkersburg,  Portsmouth,  Cincinnati, 
Louisville,  and  other  centres,  which  have  branches  extending  to  them  from  the 
main  stem.     The  road  to  Chicago  completes  the  system,  and  the  Baltimoreans 

_  claim  that  it  relegates  New  York  to 

the  commercial  inferiority  which  her 
inactive  policy  of  late  has  been  bring- 
ing upon  her.  Within  the  past  few 
years,  also,  the  metropolitan  branch  of 
the  Baltimore  and  Ohio  railroad, 
shortening  the  line  between  Wash- 
ington and  the  West  nearly  fifty  miles, 
has  been  completed;  and  a  new  branch 
is  in  construction  downward  through 
the  Valley  of  Virginia,  and  will  doubt- 
less drain  that  wonderful  agricultural 
region  into  the  Baltimore  basin, 
opening  up,  by  its  connection  with  the 
Chesapeake  and  Ohio  railroad  at 
Staunton,  the  coal,  salt  and  iron 
industries  of  Western  Virginia.  The 
road  has  also  seized  on  the  Orange, 
Alexandria   and    Manassas   line  from 


•  -    ./"'-"      '"  -■  ■  '" 
The  House  of  Refuge — Baltimore. 

Washington  to  Lynchburg,  and  given  to  it  and  its  extensions  the  new  name  of 
the  Washington  City,  Virginia  Midland,  and  Great  Southern. 

The  contest  with  the  Chesapeake  and  Ohio  Canal  Company  for  the  right 
of  way  along  the  Potomac,  when  the  Baltimore  and  Ohio  railroad  was  in  its 
infancy,  brought  into  play  the  abilities  of  some  of  the  finest  leaders  of  the  bar. 
In  the  trials  of  the  Court  of  Appeals,  where  the  struggle  for  the  choice  of  route 
was  a  prolonged  one,  and  where  the  decision  was  finally  given  in  favor  of  the 
railroads,  the  clear-headed  Taney,  the  commanding  Webster,  the  majestic  and 
elegant  Wirt,  the  philanthropic  Mercer,  the  accurate  Gwynn,  and  the  then  young 
and  aspiring  Reverdy  Johnson,  made  brilliant  speeches.  Among  the  men  who 
planned  and  executed  the  through  route  were  some  of  the  most  noted  citizens  of 
Maryland ;  the  names  of  Robert  Oliver,  of  Alexander  Brown,  of  William 
Lorman,  of  Isaac  McKim,of  William  Patterson,  Talbot  Jones,  George  Hoffman, 
John  B.  Morris,  William  Stewart,  and  Philip  E.  Thomas,  are  inseparably  connected 
with  the  projection  of  this  great  work.  They  were,  in  a  measure,  the  pioneers  of 
the  railway  system  of  this  country,  and  to  them  and  the  thousands  who  have 
emulated  their  example  in  every  State  of  the  Union  we  owe  our  material 
prosperity  as  a  nation. 

The  men  who  determined  to  make  Baltimore  the  chief  of  American  ports 
did  not  overlook  the  necessity  for  proper  terminal  facilities.  This  subject  engaged 
the  attention  of  the  company  from  the  moment  of  its  organization ;  but  during 
its  early  years,  the  main  terminus  was  a  small  depot,  which  has  since  expanded 


LOCUST     POINT 


745 


into  the  great  Mount  Clare  Station,  where  to-day  there  are  acres  of  repair  shops 
and  locomotive  houses.  When  the  company  had  once,  resolved  to  provide  a 
tide- water  terminus,  it  lost  no  time  in  selecting  and  purchasing  the  grounds  at 
Locust  Point,  a  narrow  strip  of  land  at  the  entrance  of  Baltimore  harbor, 
admirably  adapted  for  the  construction  of  wharves.  The  misguided  stranger 
who  fancies  that  Baltimore  is  a  torpid  town,  where  business  enterprise  is  rarely 
hinted  at,  would  do  well  to  visit  Locust  Point,  and  correct  his  previous 
impressions.  ' 

The  whole  peninsula,  of  which  Locust  Point  is  the  terminus,  has  always 
been  considered  most  advantageous  for  shipments.  Early  in  the  Revolution 
an  English  corporation  obtained  possession  of  it ;  but  the  plans  of  the  company 
were  overthrown  by  an  act  of  confiscation,  under  which  the  Point  was  taken 
by  the  State  and  sold.  In  later  years,  the  peninsula  was  selected  as  the  site 
for  Fort  McHenry,  the  principal  defense  of  the  harbor.  The  peninsula  has  about 
five  miles  of  water- frontage,  along  every  portion  of  which  there  is  a  depth  of 
from  seventeen  to  twenty-one  feet,  easily  increased  to  twenty-five.  Locust 
Point  proper  comprises  a  water-front  of  about  3,600  lineal  feet,  and  an  area 
of  eighty  acres,  seamed  with  railway  tracks,  covered  with  gigantic  sheds  and 
warehouses,  and  dotted  with  immense  wharves,  on  which  stand  two  mammoth 
elevators,  one  of  which  has  a  capacity  of  600,000,  and  the  other  1,500,000 
bushels.  These  elevators,  through 
which  the  grain,  poured  into  Balti- 
more by  thousands  of  cars  from  the 
great  West,  passes  directly  into  the 
holds  of  Norwegian,  Danish,  and 
English  vessels,  are  superior  to  any 
buildings  of  the  kind  on  the  Atlantic 
coast.  Their  foundations  rest  upon 
thousands  of  piles,  driven  deep  into 
the  harbor-bed,  and  covered  with  oak 
cappings,  upon  which  the  massive 
granite  is  laid.  The  elevator  last 
built  stands  upon  no  less  than  twelve 
thousand  piles.  Both  are  surrounded 
by  water  upon  three  sides,  and  the 
vessels  flocking  about  them  seem  like 
swallows  nestling  on  the  sides  of  some 
huge  barn.  To  the  great  steamship 
piers,  which  are  covered  with  iron 
sheds  and  into  which  double  track 
lines  of  railway  run,  come  weekly  steamships  from  Bremen,  and  thousands  of 
emigrants  annually  pass  westward  through  Baltimore. 

The  present  piers  are  already  inadequate  to  the  business  which  is  poured  on 
to  them,  and  new  ones  will  soon  be  erected.  A  huge  ferry,  upon  which 
cars  coming  from  the  West  with  freight  for  Eastern  cities  are  transferred  to  the 


The  Blind  Asylum  —  Baltimore,  Maryland. 


746 


BUSINESS      ACTIVITY      OF      LOCUST      POINT. 


The  Eastern  High  School  —  Baltimore,  Maryland. 


opposite  side  of  the  harbor,  where  connection  is  made  with  the  Philadelphia, 
Wilmington  and  Baltimore  railroad,  is  another  of  the  noted  sights  at  Locust 
Point.  When  trade  is  busiest  more  than  two  hundred  and  fifty  cars  a  day  are 
thus  transferred,  and  the  company  intends  hereafter  to  obviate  the  necessity  of 

hauling  passenger  trains,  by  horse 
power,  through  the  city,  by  running 
them  to  Locust  Point  across  the 
I  harbor  in  barges  of  the  ferry.  A 
huge  coffee  warehouse  has  been 
erected  near  the  elevator. 

The  activity  at  this  point  is  simply 
wonderful.  A  walk  along  the  piers 
shows  an  immense  panorama  of  stores 
of  railroad  iron,  iron  ore,  bonded  ware- 
houses crammed  with  imported 
merchandise  ;  great  double  piers  along 
which  hover  coastwise  steamers ;  the 
huge  bulk  of  a  Liverpool  steam-liner 
discharging  its  freight;  the  graceful 
outlines  of  a  "  North  German  Lloyd," 
with  its  flat-capped  and  clumsy-looking  sailors  peering  over  the  sides ;  while 
thousands  of  cars  rattle  forward  and  backward  into  and  out  of  mysterious  sheds, 
and  floods  of  grain  pour  down  from  spouts  into  quaint  little  barks,  whose 
captains  tranquilly  smoke  their  pipes  as  the  process  of  loading  goes  on.  When 
one  understands  that  a  thousand  coal-cars  can  be  daily  unloaded  at  Locust 
Point,  and  that  all  the  coal  for  the  huge  fleet  of  ocean  steamers  plying  between 
New  York  and  Europe  is  shipped  from  Baltimore,  he  begins  to  comprehend  the 
reasons  for  the  constant  arrival  of  trains  filled  with  their  sooty  freight. 

For  the  month  ending  June  30,  1874,  13,861  coal-cars,  2,072  grain-cars,  and 
3,512  cars  loaded  with  miscellaneous  freight  were  received  and  emptied  at  Locust 
Point.  The  elevators  are  monuments  to  the  astonishing  increase  of  the  grain 
trade  of  Baltimore.  In  1871,  the  exports  of  bulk  grain  from  the  city  were  hardly 
2,000,000  bushels.  As  soon  as  the  first  elevator  was  opened,  they  increased 
to  4,000,000  bushels  annually,  and  in  1873,  they  amounted  to  7,250,000  bushels. 
The  citizens  of  Baltimore,  who  once  fancied  that  the  improvements  in  terminal 
facilities  would  only  enrich  the  company  and  not  aid  the  city,  have  been  shown 
conclusively  that  all  kinds  of  property  in  Baltimore  increases  in  ratio  with  the 
increase  of  export  trade.  The  exports  for  the  six  months  ending  July  1,  1874, 
amounted  to  more  than  $15,250,000,  or  $6,000,000  more  than  the  corresponding 
six  months  of  1873,  and  exceeding  by  $3,000,000  the  entire  exports  of  1870. 
Now  that  the  elevators  are  in  direct  connection  with  railway  tracks  penetrating- 
the  West,  the  grain  receipts  for  the  first  six  months  of  1874  amounted  to  but 
600,000  bushels  less  than  those  of  the  entire  year  of  1873,  and  the  close  of 
1874  will  witness  the  completion  of  elevators  at  Locust  Point  and  at  Canton 
whose  united  capacity  will  increase  the  grain  trade  at  Baltimore  to  10,000,000 


HARBOR      IMPROVEMENT.  747 

bushels  for  the  last  half  of  the  current  year.  Certainly,  it  is  not  without  some 
reason  that  the  enthusiastic  Baltimore  merchants  predict  that  they  may  claim 
$50,000,000  in  exports  annually  in  a  few  years. 

The  improvement  of  the  harbor  of  Baltimore  was  for  many  years  talked  of 
as  desirable,  but  did  not  become  an  imperative  necessity  until  the  action  of  the 
railroad  company  had  made  the  town  one  of  the  most  important  of  Ameri- 
can ports.  It  was  evident  that  if  Baltimore  was  to  have  a  large  European  trade, 
her  ship-channel,  leading  from  the  Patapsco  river  into  the  Chesapeake,  must 
be  deepened.  Large  appropriations  were  made  by  Congress  and  the  city  of 
Baltimore,  in  equal  portions.  The  new  channels  will  permit  the  approach  to  the 
city  at  low  water  of  vessels  drawing  from  twenty-two  and  a-half  to  twenty-three 
feet ;  and  at  high  water,  of  those  drawing  twenty-four  to  twenty-five  feet.  The 
only  improvements  now  necessary  are  such  as  will  allow  vessels  of  the  largest 
draft  to  load  directly  at  the  wharves,  and  this  work,  which  is  being  rapidly 
effected  by  the  River  and  Harbor  Commission,  comprehends  the  deepening 
of  the  channel  to  the  wharves  from  Fort  McHenry. 


View  of  a  Lake  in  Druid  Hill  Park,  Baltimore. 


48 


LXXXIV. 

THE     TRADE     OF     BALTIMORE  —  ITS     RAPID     AND     ASTONISHING 

GROWTH. 


THE  view  of  Baltimore  harbor,  as  one  enters  it  from  the  Chesapeake  on  one 
of  the  noble  steamers  of  the  Norfolk  and  Baltimore  line,  is  highly 
picturesque.  At  the  narrow  mouth  of  the  long  and  irregularly-shaped  basin, 
which  is  thronged  on  either  side  with  groups  of  imposing  buildings,  stands  Fort 
McHenry. 

On  the  eastward  shore,  and  nearly  opposite  Locust  Point,  is  Canton,  which 
was  laid  out  by  a  company  organized  in  1828,  and  has  sprung  into  a  wonderfully 
active  life  during  the  past  few  years.  In  addition  to  its  wharf  property,  the 
Canton  Company  to-day  owns  twenty-eight  hundred  acres  of  land,  and  a  water- 
front of  twenty  thousand   feet.      Many  of  the    most    important    manufacturing 

interests  of  Baltimore  are  located  in 
this  active  suburb.  Oyster  and  fruit 
packing- houses,  sugar  refineries, 
brick- yards,  foundries,  steam  saw- 
mills, iron  and  copper  smelting  fur- 
naces, coal  oil  refineries,  breweries 
and  distilleries,  ship-yards  and  bat- 
ting factories  are  densely  crowded 
together  along  the  streets  arising  from 
the  water,  and  five  to  six  thousand 
operatives  are  employed  in  the 
various  works. 

The  Canton  Company  has  shown 
itself  capable  of  the  largest  enterprise 
in  increasing  the  terminal  facilities  of 
Baltimore,  and  is  constantly  adding 
to  its  wharfage  forests  of  piles,  their 
scraggy  heads,  which  appear  above  the 
dark  water,  testifying  to  the  rapidity 
with  which  new  wharves  can  be  built 
as  soon  as  they  are  needed.  The 
railroads  centring  at  Canton  drain  a  vast  extent  of  rich  country,  and  the  elevators 
to  be  erected  there  will  make  it,  in  time,  as  important  a  terminus  as  its  busy 
neighbor,  Locust  Point.  The  Union  railroad,  projected  mainly  under  the 
auspices  of  the  Canton  Company,  was  a  gigantic  undertaking,  adding  immensely 


Maryland  Institute  —  Baltimore. 


THE      UNION      RAILROAD CANTON    S      GRAIN      TRADE. 


749 


to  the  commercial  advantages  of  Baltimore, —  its  double  tracks  connecting 
the  Baltimore  and  Potomac,  the  Western  Maryland,  the  Northern  Central,  and 
the  Philadelphia,  Wilmington  and  Baltimore  railroads.  Much  of  it  was  con- 
structed at  great  outlay  through  tunnels  under  the  city  and  over  treacherous 
soil ;  but  the  two  million  dollars  which 
it  cost  are  a- mere  bagatelle  when 
compared  with  the  increase  of  trade 
which  it  will  give  the  city,  as  it 
affords  another  long-needed  outlet  to 
tide-water.  It  is,  indeed,  precisely 
the  kind  of  road  so  much  needed 
to-day  in  Boston  and  New  York, 
and  which  neither  of  those  great 
cities  has  yet  shown  sufficient  sagac- 
ity to  provide.  All  the  railroads 
passing  through  Baltimore  are  entitled 
to  its  use  at  a  fixed  rate  per  mile. 

When  the  Canton  elevators  are 
completed,  Baltimore  harbor  will  be 
richer  in  facilities  for  immediate  and 
convenient  shipment  to  Europe  of 
Western  produce  than  any  other  city 
on  the  continent.  The  grain  trade 
now  centring  at  Canton  is  enormous, 
but  the  elevators  there  are  totally 
insufficient  to  meet  the  demand. 
The  sugar  refinery  at  Canton  has  large  piers,  and  the  chemical  and  oil  works, 
and  the  distilleries,  together  covering  many  acres,  require  extensive  wharf 
accommodation.  Large  coal  oil  manufactories  are  shortly  to  be  established  along 
the  water-front  at  Baltimore,  and  will  add  much  to  the  business  of  the  new 
Union  railroad. 

The  completion  of  the  Baltimore  and  Potomac  railroad,  in  1873,  forming  a  new 
connection  between  Baltimore  and  Washington,  opened  up  five  of  the  most  fertile 
lower  counties  on  the  western  shore  of  the  State — counties  which  heretofore 
have  had  no  ready  means  of  communication  with  the  metropolis  except  by  water. 
The  railroad  included  the  construction  of  large  tunnels  both  at  Baltimore  and 
Washington,  and  forms  a  very  important  link  in  the  great  Southern  line  of  the 
Pennsylvania  Central  railroad.  It  has  had  a  marked  influence  upon  the  character 
of  the  population  of  the  western  shore. 

The  residents  of  that  section  before  the  war  were  large  slave-holders,  and 
contented  themselves  with  an  unambitious  life,  devoted  mainly  to  the  raising  of 
large  crops  of  tobacco  and  cereals,  and  with  the  ordinary  enjoyments  of  the 
country  gentlemen  of  Maryland.  Among  them,  however,  there  were  many  who, 
before  the  slavery  regime  had  passed  away,  saw  the  necessity  of  a  means  of 
speedy  transit  to  and  from  the  sea-board,  and  at  the  close  of  the  war  they  were 


Woodberry,  near  Druid  Hill  Park. 


75o 


RAILWAYS      TRIBUTARY     TO      BALTIMORE. 


prominent  in  aiding  in  the  building  and  equipment  of  the  road.  This  great  work, 
which  is  one  of  the  most  solidly  constructed  in  the  United  States,  cost  nearly 
six    and  a-half  millions  of  dollars,  one  hundred  thousand   cubic  yards  of  rock 

having  been  blasted  through  during 
the  construction  of  the  tunnel  in. 
Baltimore.  It  has  already  given  an 
important  impetus  to  forming  a  trade 
along  its  whole  line.  The  Western 
Maryland  railroad,  which  extends 
from  Williamsport  on  the  Potomac 
river  to  tide-water  at  Baltimore,  was 
completed  in  December  of  1873.  It 
is  a  work  which  called  for  the  best 
engineering  talent,  built  as  it  is  across 
the  very  summit  of  the  Blue  Ridge. 
From  this  summit  a  fine  view  is 
obtained  of  the  vast  valley  of  the 
Cumberland,  which,  backed  with  its 
rugged  mountain  slopes,  and  filled  with 
flourishing  farms  and  villages,  presents 

The  New  City  Halli-  Baltimore,  Maryland.  .         ,  „  r       r 

y       '  '      y  a    constant    panorama    of  charming 

scenery.  The  road's  main  service  to  Baltimore  will  consist  in  the  current  of 
coal    which    it    can    pour   from    Williamsport    on    to    the    wharves    at    Canton. 

The    Northern    Central    railway,  =____:_^=^=^;_^;a__^_^_^ 

formerly  known  as  the  Baltimore  and  -- ■   :         :  nllHfc 

Susquehanna,  was    one    of  the    first         ^-jjjj  pUdd    -r      I  ftUBt 

routes    to    import    locomotives   from        Jr:  j  Jr>  : 

Liverpool  in  the  early  history  of  rail-  Sp? 

road  travel ;    and    by  its    connection        -%,  jifjL 

to-day  with  the  great  Pennsylvania 
road,  and,  through  that  route,  with 
the  Lakes,  the  West,  the  North- 
west, and  the  South,  is  a  valuable 
feeder  to  Baltimore  commerce.  The 
Northern  Central  Railroad  Company 
has  invested  very  largely  in  lands  at 
Canton,  and  proposes  the  erection  of 
spacious  piers,  wharves,  and  elevators, 
for  the  reception  of  the  grain  from 
the  West.  It  runs  through  a  line  of 
busy  suburban  villages,  filled,  like  the 
manufacturing  towns  in  the  most 
prosperous  sections  of  New  Eng- 
land, with  small  manufacturing  establishments;  passes  Timonium,  where  the 
old  Maryland  families    were  wont    to  attend    the    annual   State  races;    passes 


Lafayette  Square,  Baltimore,  Maryland. 


BALTIMORE   COAL  AND   GRAIN   TRADE.  75  I 

Cockeysville,  near  which  marble,  granite,  and  lime  quarries,  and  important 
iron  works  are  located ;  and  crosses  the  Gunpowder  river,  a  small  tributary  of  the 
Chesapeake,  which  winds  picturesquely  among  overhanging  rocks.  Over  this 
route  to  Harrisburg,  and  thence  by  Altoona  across  the  Alleghanies,  goes  a  great 
share  of  the  through  travel  from  South  and  East  to  West. 

The  coal  trade  of  Baltimore  has  been  very  largely  increased  by  the  rapid 
railroad  development  of  the  past  two  years.  The  Maryland  coal  regions,  which 
stretch  away  through  the  George's  Creek  valley  from  Piedmont  to  Frostburg, 
furnish  millions  of  tons  yearly.  In  this  Cumberland  region,  situated  about  two 
hundred  miles  from  Baltimore,  the  stores  of  coal  are  almost  inexhaustible.  The 
city  can  certainly  count  upon  supplies  from  them  for  many  centuries.  It  is  but  a 
few  years  since  seventeen  hundred  tons  were  considered  a  heavy  shipment  yearly 
from  the  Cumberland  mines,  but  in  1872  1,915,000  tons  were  shipped  thence  to 
Baltimore,  while  in  the  same  year  the  city  received  600,000  tons  of  gas  and 
anthracite  coal  from  Western  Virginia  and  Pennsylvania,  Baltimore  can  to-day 
supply  coal  freights  for  five  thousand  vessels.  Her  coastwise  trade  in  coal  is 
enormous,  and  within  the  past  two  years  her  foreign  trade  has  sprung  into 
proportions  which  bid  fair  to  rival  those  of  any  port  in  the  world.  The  demand 
in  the  Baltimore  market  has  at  all  times  latterly  been  difficult  to  meet,  and  vast 
as  are  the  resources  of  the  Baltimore  and  Ohio  railroad  and  the  Chesapeake  and 
Ohio  canal,  they  are  quite  insufficient.  It  is  proposed  to  extend  the  Western 
Maryland  line  until  it  taps  the  Pennsylvania  railroad,  thus  giving  a  shorter 
route  than  any  present  one  to  Pittsburg,  by  means  of  which  the  trade  will  be 
still  further  increased. 

In  1873  the  Baltimore  and  Ohio  railroad  brought  2,752,178  tons  of  coal  to 
Baltimore. 

The  comparative  receipts  of  grain  for  four  years  are  as  follows  : 

1873.                            1872.  1871.  1870. 

Wheat,.; 2,810,917      2,456,100  4,076,017     3>°39>357 

Corn, 8,330,449     9,045,465  5>735;921      3>83i,676 

Oats, 1,255,072     1,959,161  1,833,409     1,243,720 

Rye, 100,519     90/938  88,956     77,772 

Peas, 10,000     10,000  10,000     10,000 

Beans, 30,000     30,000  30,000     30,000 


Total, 12,536,967  13,571,664  11,774,303  8,232,531 

The  coffee  and  flour  trades  of  Baltimore  are  very  extensive.  In  the  impor- 
tation of  coffee  Baltimore  stands  second  among  the  ports  of  the  United  States, 
the  receipts  there  being  more  than  twice  the  aggregate  entries  at  the  chief 
ports  of  Boston,  Philadelphia  and  New  Orleans.  It  has  indeed  become  a  port 
of  entry  for  New  York  coffee  merchants  because  of  the  facilities  offered  for 
economical  handling.  The  imports  for  1873  amounted  to  384,808  bags.  The 
receipts  of  flour  for  the  same  year  from  the  West  footed  up  1,054,033  barrels, 
and  the  product  of  the  city  mills  during  that  time  was  258,579  barrels.  The 
trade  in  flour  has  steadily  increased  for  the  past  seven  years,  and  the  exports 


752 


SUGAR,  TOBACCO,  AND   IRON   INTERESTS. 


of  that  article   from  the  city  for  1873  amounted  to  359,566  barrels,  many  of 
which  went  to  Brazil  and  the  West  Indies. 

The  sugar  trade  of  Baltimore  is  also  very  extensive,  and  the  Baltimore, 
Maryland,  Calvert  and  Chesapeake  refineries  work  up  more  than  100,000,000 
pounds  of  the  crude  material  annually.  In  1871  these  refineries  produced 
91,000,000  pounds  of  refined  sugar,  and  the  total  supply  for  1873  was 
g6,^8y  tons.  In  1873  the  sugar  refineries  of  Baltimore  took  75,000  tons  of  sugar 
and  30,000  hogsheads  of  molasses.  The  six  refineries  which  work  up  pure 
sugar  and  molasses  produced  in  that  same  year  75,000  tons  of  refined  sugars 
and  syrups.  Baltimore  ranks  now  only  second  to  New  York  as  a  sugar  market. 
The  tobacco  trade  has  long  been  of  great  importance  to  the  city.  In  colonial 
days  it  was  the  chief  dependence  of  its  commerce,  and  the  old  inspection  laws, 

which  were  very  judicious,  still  remain 
w  in  force.     The  city  has  now  six  large 

tobacco  warehouses.  During  1873, 
65,067  hogsheads  were  inspected,  and 
more  than  50,000  were  exported  to 
Bremen,  Rotterdam,  Amsterdam,  Eng- 
land, France,  Spain,  Trieste,  Italy  and 
Antwerp.  Most  of  the  tobacco  sold 
at  Baltimore  comes  from  the  interior 
of  Maryland,  from  Ohio,  and  from 
Kentucky,  and  is  principally  used  in 
Germany  and  France.  Baltimore  has 
many  large  factories  for  the  manufac- 
ture of  tobacco,  and  millions  of  cigars 
are  made  there  every  year. 

In  lumber,  iron,  cotton,  and  petro- 
leum the  trade  of  this  active  commercial 
centre  is  also  rapidly  increasing.  The 
export  of  lumber  to  Germany  now  forms  a  very  lucrative  branch  of  trade.  The 
receipts  of  oil  from  Western  Virginia  and  Pennsylvania  wells  in  1873  were 
399,360  barrels,  and  there  are  numerous  oil  refineries  which  prepare  the  crude 
petroleum  for  export.  The  total  exports  of  oil  in  1873  were  3,470,995  gallons; 
and  66,415  bags  of  oil-cake  were  also  sent  abroad. 

Not  so  much  progress  has  been  made  latterly  in  the  iron  trade  as  in  other 
branches.  In  1872  there  were  in  the  State  twenty  blast  furnaces,  producing 
upward  of  54,000  tons,  but  the  production  in  1873  did  not  probably  reach 
50,000  tons.  The  importations  of  English  and  Scotch  iron  to  Baltimore,  are 
yearly  decreasing.  There  are  a  number  of  bar  and  plate  iron  works  in  the 
city  which  do  a  very  heavy  business.  One  company  alone  controls  four  plate- 
mills  which  yield  an  annual  product  of  a  million  dollars  in  value.  The  rolling- 
mills  of  the  great  railroad  corporations  are  vast.  A  journey  through  the  shops 
of  the  Baltimore  and  Ohio  railroad  at  Mount  Clare  is  the  work  of  a  day.  Two 
regiments  of  laborers  are  employed.      It  is  not  generally  known  that  Maryland, 


The  City  Jail  —  Baltimore,  Maryland. 


MISCELLANEOUS      TRADE      OF      BALTIMORE. 


753 


particularly  in  the  vicinity  of  Baltimore,  produces  some  of  the  best  charcoal 
pig-iron  in  the  country,  and  in  such  quantities  that  this  city  may  be  considered 
the  principal  market  for  that  staple.  Orders  are  constantly  received,  even  from 
St.  Louis,  for  "charcoal  pig."  There 
are  eleven  charcoal  furnaces  in  the 
State,  which  produced  during  1873 
nearly  25,000  tons.  The  oldest  now 
in  operation  is  the  Catoctin  furnace, 
quite  recently  built.  Pig-iron  was 
exported  from  Maryland  to  England 
as  early  as  171 7,  but  in  1737  the 
colonists  were  graciously  permitted 
to  make  bar  iron, — the  act,  however, 
providing  that  they  should  build  no 
rolling-mills  which  should  interfere 
with  the  manufactories  of  Great 
Britain.  Along  the  lines  of  the 
Philadelphia,  Wilmington  and  Balti- 
more railroad,  and  the  Washington 
branch  of  the  Baltimore  and  Ohio, 
for  a  distance  of  fifty  miles,  there  is 
a  bed  of  ore  six  to  eight  miles  wide, 
and  in  many  places  fifty  feet  deep. 
This  is  a  carbonate  of  iron  peculiar  to  Maryland,  imbedded  in  clay,  and 
yielding  from  32  to  40  per  cent,  at  the  furnaces.  In  Maryland  it  is  known 
as  chocolate  ore. 

The  copper  smelting  works  at  Canton  are  the  largest  on  the  Atlantic  coast, 
producing  from  8,000,000  to  10,000,000  pounds  of  refined  copper  per  annum. 

The  annual  cotton  receipts  usually  amount  to  from  100,000  to  120,000  bales, 
fully  one-third  of  which  is  exported  to  Liverpool  and  German  ports. 

Millions  of  swine,  slaughtered  at  the  various  packing  points  throughout  the 
West,  and  thousands  of  beef  cattle,  are  annually  received  in  Baltimore  markets, 
whence  they  are  dispersed  through  the  South  and  the  East. 

More  than  a  thousand  vessels  arrive  at  Baltimore  yearly.  The  total  value  of 
the  imports  in  1873  was  $32,116,721  ;  the  exports,  $23,387,812.  The  receipts 
of  customs  at  Baltimore  for  the  same  period,  notwithstanding  the  free  entry  of 
coffee  and  the  reduction  of  duties  on  many  other  articles,  amounted  to  nearly 
$7,000,000.  The  manufacture  of  boots  and  shoes  in  Baltimore  gives  employ- 
ment to  four  thousand  persons,  and  the  total  value  of  the  trade  in  1873  was 
more  than  $23,000,000.  The  jobbing  and  provision  trade  makes  steady  and 
rapid  progress.  More  than  two  hundred  houses  are  engaged  in  the  liquor  trade 
in  Baltimore.  The  capital  invested  in  whiskey  is  $3,000,000 ;  the  receipts  from 
sales  average  $6,000,000. 

The  gentle  oyster  furnishes  the  means  of  livelihood  to  more  than  twenty 
thousand  men,  women,  and  children,  in  this  liveliest  of  Southern  cities.      The 


The  Peabody  Institute  —  Baltimore,  Maryland 


754 


THE     MARYLAND      OYSTER      TRADE. 


the  cans,   and  fancied    that 
ambitious  rivals   sprang  up, 
with  the  oyster  packeries. 


resources  of  the  Chesapeake  bay  and  its  tributaries  are  so  vast  that  no 
competition  with  Baltimore  in  this  trade  is  possible.  More  than  thirty  years 
ago,  an  enterprising  individual  established  a  house  on  Federal  Hill  for  the 
canning  of  cooked  oysters.     He  had  discovered  the  secret  of  hermetically  sealing 

he  was  to  become  a  millionaire,  but  a  hundred 
and  whole  streets  in  Baltimore  are  to-day  lined 
Eight  hundred  small  schooners  and  three  thousand 
little  boats  are  engaged  from  the  middle  of  September  until  early  in  the  spring 
in  lifting  the  oysters  from  their  tranquil  beds  with  dredges,  tongs  and  rakes, 
and  in  bringing  them  to  the  packing  establishments,  where  they  are  ruthlessly 
torn  from  their  shells,  packed,  raw  or  cooked,  in  cans  from  which  air  is  carefully 
excluded,  and  shipped  for  inland  consumption  as  a  much-coveted  luxury.     In 

one  single  house  fifty  thousand  cans  of  raw  oysters 
are  daily  packed,  while  another  establishment  prepares 
thirty  thousand  cans  of  cooked  bivalves  in  the  same 
time.  The  manufacture  of  cans  in  which  oysters  and 
prepared  fruits  are  transported  is  not  a  small  item 
in  the  trade  of  Baltimore,  nearly  thirty  million  cans 
being  annually  manufactured  for  that  market.  Half- 
a-dozen  large  printing  houses  are  occupied  in  prepar- 
ing labels  for  the  cans,  and  long  lines  of  lime-kilns, 
with  a  capacity  of  one  thousand  to  twelve  hundred 
bushels  each,  dispose  of  the  millions  of  oyster  shells 
which  otherwise  would  block  the  streets.  One  firm 
alone  makes  more  than  600,000  bushels  of  pure 
white  lime  in  a  year.  Farmers  are  paid  to  carry 
away  the  shells  used  in  the  construction  of  roads, 
or  in  the  improvement  of  lands  near  the  city. 

When  spring  comes,  and  the  great  army  of 
employes  who  have  been  occupied  with  the  oyster 
during  the  winter  would  otherwise  be  idle,  the  fleet 
of  schooners  and  boats  penetrates  all  the  streams 
flowing  into  the  Chesapeake,  and  their  crews  pur- 
chase from  the  orchards  and  market  gardens  along 
those  streams  thousands  of  tons  of  fruit  and  vege- 
tables. The  oyster  packeries  are  transformed  into 
manufactories  of  savory  conserves.  Peaches,  pears,  apples,  berries,  tomatoes — 
pickles  of  every  imaginable  kind — are  so  prepared  that  they  can  be  exported  to 
any  part  of  the  world.  Large  kegs  are  annually  sent  to  Hindostan,  to  China, 
to  Japan,  and  throughout  middle  and  western  Europe.  The  oyster-beds  of 
Maryland  extend,  from  a  point  in  Kent  county  opposite  Baltimore,  southward 
down  to  and  up  the  Potomac  forty  miles,  a  total  of  one  hundred  and  twenty- 
five  miles,  and  east  and  west  across  the  Chesapeake  bay  and  Tangier  sound, 
and  up  all  their  tributaries  as  far  as  salt  water  reaches.  Maryland  maintains 
a  State   oyster   police  force,  employs  a  cruiser  to  protect  her  interests,  has  an 


First  Presbyterian  Church  —  Baltimore. 


BALTIMORE      CLIPPERS FEDERAL      HILL.  755 

elaborate  oyster  law,  and  in  the  shape  of  licenses,  fines,  &c,  draws  an  annual 
revenue  from  the  trade  of  between  $50,000  and  $60,000. 

From  this  slight  review  of  the  commercial  interests  of  Baltimore,  it  is  easy 
to  see  that  this  city  has  become  the  most  formidable  commercial  rival  of 
New  York  on  the  Atlantic  sea-board.  It  has  the  shortest  inland  lines  to  the 
Western  granaries ;  its  terminal  facilities  are  superb  ;  its  rates  for  transportation 
are  reasonable ;  imports  pass  with  readiness  and  dispatch  through  the  Custom- 
House,  and  importers  are  free  from  the  many  vexatious  delays  that  have  made 
New  York  a  disagreeable  port  of  entry.  It  requires  seventy-two  hours  longer 
for  a  steamer  of  3,000  tons  to  bring  her  cargo  to  Baltimore,  but  this  extra 
charge  is  offset  by  the  $2,000  which  its  owner  may  save  by  buying  its  coal  in 
Baltimore  instead  of  New  York,  while  the  difference  between  the  terminal  and 
berth  charges  of  Baltimore  and  New  York  is  great. 

The  recovery  of  the  prestige  of  Baltimore  has  greatly  encouraged  her 
leading  merchants  and  business  men,  and  has  done  away  to  some  extent  with 
that  provincial  spirit  so  long  characteristic  of  the  place.  In  1798,  when 
Baltimore  was  a  struggling  village,  it  ranked  as  the  third  commercial  port  in 
the  United  States,  had  more  than  30,000  tons  of  registered  shipping,  and 
exports  amounting  to  about  $12,000,000  annually.  Twenty  years  later,  the 
fleetest  vessels  that  floated  on  the  high  seas  under  any  flag  were  the  Baltimore 
clippers,  those  renowned  specimens  of  marine  architecture  whose  praises  were 
sung  in  every  clime,  and  of  whose  captains  there  are  yet  few  equals  and  no 
superiors.  These  clippers  were  schooner-rigged,  and  so  built  as  to  sail  within 
four  or  four  and  a-half  points  of  the  wind.  This  enabled  them  to  elude  the 
pursuit  of  any  vessels  belonging  to  blockading  squadrons  in  the  stormy  days 
between  1790  and  1807,  and  they  did  the  chief  part  of  the  American  and  West 
Indian  trade  for  this  country,  besides  a  large  carrying  trade  for  European 
nations.  But  as  the  clippers  vanished  from  the  seas,  and  Baltimore  seemed  over- 
whelmed by  that  disastrous  lack  of  energy  which  was  the  natural  consequence  of 
the  system  of  slavery,  her  commerce  slipped  away,  and  it  was  only  by  the 
projection  and  completion  of  that  mighty  work,  the  Baltimore  and  Ohio  railroad, 
which  spanned  the  Alleghanies  and  laid  hold  upon  the  fertile  fields  of  the  West, 
that  she  succeeded  in  regaining  her  proud  position.  For  the  first  five  months  of 
1874,  the  aggregate  shipments  of  wheat  and  corn  have  been  5,277,000  bushels. 
The  Liverpool  Steamship  Line  has  been  sending  extra  steamers  for  the  shipment 
of  grain,  and  everything  indicates  a  massive  and  tremendous  increase  of  trade 
in  the  old  city  from  month  to  month  and  from  year  to  year  for  many  decades 
to  come. 

From  Federal  Hill,  the  lofty  bank  south-west  of  the  inner  basin  of  Baltimore 
harbor,  a  fine  view  may  be  had  of  the  city  and  the  blue  waters  of  the  bay. 
Federal  Hill  is  an  historic  eminence.  It  was  christened  by  the  Federalists  of 
1787,  who  on  the  adoption  of  the  Constitution  of  the  United  States  testified 
their  joy  by  having  a  grand  procession,  and  rigging  and  equipping  a  model  ship 
called  the  "Federalist,"  which,  after  being  paraded  through  the  streets  of  the 
town,  was  burned  on  the  hill.      Four  thousand  persons  there  sat  down  to  a  grand 


756  VIEW      FROM      FEDERAL      HILL. 

dinner  at  which  speeches  were  made  in  favor  of  the  new  Constitution.  The  little 
ship  of  State  was  afterward  launched  and  navigated  down  Chesapeake  bay- 
to  the  mouth  of  the  Potomac  and  thence  to  Mount  Vernon,  where  it  was 
presented  to  General  Washington.  It  was  on  Federal  Hill  also  that  a  disturbance 
occurred  in  the  early  days  of  Secession,  when  an  attempt  was  made  to  display  the 
flag  of  the  South,  and  to  fire  one  hundred  guns  in  honor  of  South  Carolina. 
There,  too,  General  Butler  posted  his  troops  when  he  took  possession  of  the 
city;  and  there  are  seen  to-day  the  earthworks  thrown  up  by  the  soldiers  from 
Massachusetts  and  New  York.  Opposite  Federal  Hill,  beyond  the  basin,  the  steep 
streets  rise  to  lofty  heights,  along  which  are  built  the  fashionable  residences, 
many  of  the  public  buildings,  the  monuments,  the  churches,  the  theatres  and  the 
banks.  At  the  foot  of  the  hill,  and  grouped  about  the  unsavory  basin,  which 
emits  odors  similar  to  those  of  the  Amsterdam  and  Rotterdam  canals,  are  long 
and  by  no  means  cleanly  streets,  lined  with  petty  shops  and  crowded  with  piles 
of  wood  and  lumber,  with  bustling  stevedores  and  roustabouts,  negro  wood- 
sawyers  and  wholesale  shipping  merchants. 

Looking  out  over  this  solid  commercial  town,  and  meditating  on  its  trade's 
enormous  growth,  one  is  almost  inclined  to  forget  that  it  has  any  love  for  art. 
Yet  it  has  two  of  the  finest  private  picture  galleries  in  the  country.  The 
collections  of  Mr.  William  T.  Walters  and  Colonel  J.  Strieker  Jenkins  are  world- 
famous.  Mr.  Walters'  gallery  is  enriched  with  the  paintings  of  Delaroche, 
Meissonier,  Gerome,  Edouard  Frere,  Corot,  Plassan*,  Troyon,  Achenbach,  and 
dozens  of  other  celebrated  artists.  The  best  efforts  of  the  French  pencil,  and 
some  of  the  finest  works  of  American  artists,  grace  the  halls  of  Colonel  Jenkins. 
Rinehart,  the  sculptor,  who  died  recently  in  Italy,  has  left  to  Baltimore  much 
good  statuary. 

The  "Maryland,"  "  Allston,"  and  "Baltimore"  Clubs  are  remembered  with 
pleasure  by  all  visitors  to  the  metropolis.  Their  graceful  hospitality  and  the 
memories  of  the  luxurious  terrapin  which  they  recall  can  never  fade  away.  The 
theatrical  edifices  are  very  good,  and  when  the  new  "  Academy  of  Music  "  is 
completed,  the  town  will  have  a  charming  opera  house. 


LXXXV. 

BALTIMORE     AND      ITS     INSTITUTIONS. 

BALTIMORE  well  deserves  the  name  of  the  "  Monumental  City,"  many  years 
ago  bestowed  upon  it.  The  stately  column  which  rises  from  a  hill  in  the 
fashionable  quarter  of  the  city,  and  known  as  the  Washington  Monument,  is  180 
feet  high.  It  is  surmounted  by  a  colossal  statue  of  the  Father  of  his  Country,. 
and  on  the  great  pedestal,  from  each  side  of  which  radiate  pretty  parks  and. 
fine  avenues,  are  the  following  inscriptions : 

To 

George    Washington, 

by  the 

State   of   Maryland. 


Born   February   22,    1732. 


Commander-in-Chief  of  the  American  Army,   June    15,    1775. 

Trenton,   December  25,    1776. 

Yorktown,    October    19,    1781. 

Commission  Resigned  at  Annapolis,   December  23,    1783. 


President  of  the   United  States,   March  4,    1782. 
Retired  to  Mount  Vernon,    March  4,    1797. 
Died  December   14,    1799.    - 

The  square  in  which  the  monument  stands  is  called  Mount  Vernon,  after  the 
home  of  General  Washington.  On  the  south  side  of  the  square  is  the  Peabody 
Institute,  founded  by  the  famous  banker,  George  Peabody,  who  never  forgot,  in 
his  liberal  series  of  donations,  his  adopted  home  and  the  scene  of  his  early 
business  success.  On  the  12th  of  February,  1857,  Mr.  Peabody  donated  $300,000 
to  the  city  for  the  establishment  of  an  Institute,  and  appointed  a  number  of 
prominent  citizens  as  trustees  of  the  fund.  It  is  devoted,  to  the  selection  of  a 
fine  library  and  the  creation  of  an  academy  of  music,  and  is  intended  to  foster 
the  elevation  of  the  middle  class.  Every*  citizen  of  Baltimore  can  avail  himself 
of  the  advantages  of  the  Institute,  which  has  already  done  much  for  the  encour- 
agement of  public  taste  and  knowledge  in  special  branches  of  art. 

A  little  to  the  west  of  the  Peabody  Institute  stands  Grace  Church,  and  north 
of  it  the  First  Presbyterian  Church,  one  of  the  most  beautiful  religious  edifices 
in   the   country.      A  little  south   of  the  monument    is  the  old  cathedral.     This. 


758 


THE      MONUMENTS     OF      BALTIMORE. 


noble  building,  which  was  begun  in   1806,  is  in  the  form  of  a  Roman  cross,  and 
is  a  massive  and  imposing  structure.     It  was  finally  completed  only  in   1865. 
The  interior  is  decorated  with  many  paintings,  some  of  which  are  of  rare  merit. 
The  Battle   Monument,  which  stands  in  Monument  Square,  was  erected  in 

memory  of  the  citizens  who  fell  in 
defense  of  Baltimore  at  the  battle  of 
North  Point,  at  the  bombardment  of 
Fort  McHenry  in  18 14.  The  shaft  of 
the  monument  is  a  fasces,  symbolical 
of  the  Union,  and  the  rods  are  bound 
together  by  a  fillet  on  which  are 
inscribed  the  names  of  those  who  were 
killed.  On  the  north  and  south  fronts 
of  the  base  of  the  fasces  are  two  excel- 
lent bas-reliefs,  one  representing  the 
death  of  General  Ross  at  the  battle 
of  North  Point,  and  the  other  the 
bombardment  of  the  fort.  The  column 
is  surmounted  by  a  statue  of  Balti- 
more, and  at  the  feet  of  the  statue 
stands  an  eagle.  The  monument  is 
enclosed  with  an  iron  railing,  outside 
of  which  are  chains  fastened  to  marble 
cannon.  Around  Monument  Square 
are  grouped  the  City  Hall,  formerly 
the  residence  of  Reverdy  Johnson ;  Barnum's  Hotel,  which  Charles  Dickens 
praised  as  one  of  the  best  hotels  in  the  country ;  and  the  famous  Guy's 
Restaurant,  where  the  terrapin  and  soft-shelled  crab  are  served  in  all  the  glory 
and  perfection  of  Baltimore  cookery. 

Wildey  Monument,  on  Broadway,  above  Baltimore  street,  is  an  imposing 
column  designed  to  perpetuate  the  memory  of  Past  Grand  Sire  Thomas  Wildey, 
the  founder  of  the  Odd -Fellows  in  America.  In  the  Green  Mount  cemetery 
stands  the  McDonough  statue,  erected  to  the  memory  of  a  philanthropic 
merchant,  who  was  a  son  of  Baltimore,  and  a  prominent  citizen  of  New  Orleans ; 
and  in  Ashland  Square  a  plain  but  massive  column  commemorates  the  two 
youths  who  slew  General  Ross,  the  Commander  of  the  British  forces,  in  the 
battle  in  18 12. 

Prominent  among  the  public  buildings  of  Baltimore  is  the  new  City  Hall, 
which  is  an  imposing  structure  of  composite  architecture,  in  which  the  Renais- 
sance predominates.  It  fills  the  entire  square  enclosed  by  Holliday,  Lexington, 
North,  and  Fayette  streets.  The  dome,  which  adds  but  little  in  beauty  to  the 
building,  is  222  feet  above  the  level  of  the  ground.  The  City  Hall  is  situated 
in  the  business  portion  of  the  town ;  and,  if  it  were  not  walled  in  by  numerous 
inferior  buildings,  would  be  a  fine  ornament.  The  Exchange,  in  Gay  street,  is 
a  noticeable  building,  with  fine  Ionic  columns  on  its  east  and  west  sides,  and  is 


Mount  Vernon  Square,  with  a  view  of  the  Washington 
Monument,  Baltimore,  Maryland. 


THE     MARYLAND      INSTITUTE HOSPITALS. 


759 


also  surmounted  by  a  huge  dome,  something  like  an  inverted  butter-bowl.  The 
Custom-House  and  Post-Omce  are  in  this  building,  the  former  fronting  on 
Lombard  street,  a  busy  and  substantial  avenue.  On  Baltimore  street,  the  main 
commercial  avenue  of  the  town,  is  the  Maryland  Institute  for  promoting  the 
mechanic  arts.  It  is  a  handsome  and  commodious  structure,  the  ground  floor 
of  which  is  occupied  by  the  Centre  market.  The  main  hall  of  this  building  is 
one  of  the  largest  in  the  country,  and  during  the  annual  Mechanics'  Fair 
thousands  of  visitors  from  all  parts  of  the  State  flock  into  it.  It  was  in  this  hall 
that  Breckenridge  was  nominated  by  the  Southern  politicians  in  i860,  and  that 
the  great  Union  Sanitary  Fair  in 
1863,  and  the  Southern  Relief  Fair 
in  1866,  were  held.  The  schools 
of  design  connected  with  the  Insti- 
tute are  in  admirable  condition,  and 
the  library  is  large  and  constantly 
increasing  in  size.  The  Court- 
House,  at  the  corner  of  Monument 
Square  and  Lexington  street,  is  a 
highly  ornamented  marble  and  brick 
building,  surrounded  by  streets  filled 
with  the  offices  of  the  legal  fraternity. 
The  new  United  States  Court- House, 
at  the  corner  of  North  and  Fayette 
streets,  is  a  massive  building.  On 
Madison  street  stand  the  City  Prison 
and  the  State  Penitentiary. 

Baltimore  is  very  rich  in  charita- 
ble institutions.  The  Maryland 
Hospital  for  the  Insane,  a  fine  build- 
ing on  East  Monument  street  in  the 
eastern  part  of  the  city;  the  Mount 
Hope  Hospital,  conducted  by  the 
Sisters  of  Charity;  the  Baltimore 
Infirmary,  controlled  by  the  regents 
of  the  University ;  the  Washington 
Medical  College,  the  Washington  Infirmary,  many  "  Homes"  for  aged  people, 
the  Maryland  Institution  for  the  Instruction  of  the  Blind ;  the  Church  Home, 
conducted  by  the  Protestant  Episcopal  Church  of  the  city ;  the  orphan  asylums 
of  St.  Anthony  and  St.  Vincent  de  Paul  (Bay  View  Asylum,  or  the  Work- 
house, which  stands  on  the  Philadelphia  road,  a  short  distance  from  the  eastern, 
limits  of  the  city,  can  accommodate  twelve  hundred  persons,  and  cost  a  million 
of  dollars),  the  Maryland  State  Insane  Asylum,  on  the  Frederick  road,  six 
miles  from  the  city,  and  the  Sheppard  Asylum  for  the  Insane,  are  all  testimonials- 
to  the  liberality  and  beneficence  of  the  wealthy.  The  will  of  Mr.  McDonoughr 
by    which  very    large    sums  were  left    to  Baltimore  and    New  Orleans    to    be 


The  Battle  Monument,  seen  from  Bamum's  Hotel  —  Baltimore. 


760 


DONATION      BY      MOSES      SHEPPARD. 


devoted  to   the  education  of   poor  children,   gave   the   former  $800,000,  which 

the  trustees  have  expended  in  purchasing  a  large  farm  ten  miles  from  the  city, 

and  where  they  propose  to  erect  a  fine 
institution  in  which  hundreds  of  pupils 
will  receive  constant  instruction  in 
English  studies,  music,  and  agriculture. 
Beggars  are  rarities  in  Baltimore. 
The  "Association  for  the  Improvement 
of  the  Condition  of  the  Poor  "  has  the 
most  prominent  of  the  citizens  enrolled 
upon  its  books,  and  all  who  are  worthy 
objects  of  charity  receive  prompt  assist- 
ance. A  host  of  minor  charitable 
institutions,  under  the  charge  of  the 
Catholic  and  Protestant  Churches,  aid 
the  above-mentioned  useful  society  ; 
and,  as  the  system  of  tenement  houses 
is  almost  entirely  unknown  in  the  city, 
but  little  of  the  misery  and  wretched- 
ness so  peculiar  to  large  towns  is 
noticeable.  The  munificent  donation 
of  $600,000,  left  Baltimore  some  years 
ago  by  Moses  Sheppard  for  the  estab- 
lishment of  a  hospital  for  the  insane, 

has,  by  judicious  investments,  increased  to  nearly  a  million  dollars,  and  a  beautiful 

Elizabethan  structure,  which  is  to  be  surrounded  by  one  of  the  most  exquisite 

landscape    gardens     in     the     United 

States,    is    now    arising   a    few    miles 

from  Baltimore.    The  establishment  is 

mainly  designed  as  a  curative  hos- 
pital, while    Mount    Hope,   in    the 

north-western   centre    of  the   city,   is 

devoted    to    the    treatment   of  the 

incurably   insane.       The    Deaf  and 

Dumb    Asylum,    which    has    been 

established  by  the  State  in  Frederick 

City,  has  also  received  liberal  dona- 
tions from  the  people  of  Baltimore. 

The   venerable    Thomas    Kelso,    for 

eighty-two    years    a    citizen    of    the 

Monumental    City,  some    time  since 

endowed    a   Methodist  Episcopal 

Orphan  Asylum  with  $100,000,  and 

a    wealthy    lumber    dealer    has    left 

nearly  half  a  million  for  the  establish-      '  The  CathTdmi- Baltimore,  Maryland. 


The  Battle  Monument — Baltimore,  Maryland.      [Page  758.] 


JOHNS      HOPKINS      AND      HIS     GIFTS. 


761 


ment  of  an   asylum   for  female   orphans.       The    House  of    Refuge  for  vagrant 

and   vicious   children,   opened  in    1855,  is  a  noble   range  of  buildings  situated 

a  short  distance  beyond  the  western 

limits  of  the  city,  and  within  its  walls 

nearly    2,000    boys    and    girls    have 

been    taught   trades    and  received    a 

plain    but    comprehensive    educa- 
tion    since    the     inauguration    of 

the  city.      The    Baltimore    Orphan 

Asylum,  founded   in  1801,  the   Chil- 
dren's   Aid  Society,    the    Baltimore 

Manual    Labor    School,    the    Male 

Free   School  for  Baltimore,  and   the 

Maryland  Industrial  School  for  Girls, 

have  all  been  amply  and  generously 

supported  since  their  foundation.  . 
Mr.  Johns    Hopkins,  one   of  the 

merchant  princes  of  Baltimore,   and 

identified   with   its  history   for  more 

than  half  a  century,  left  the  bulk  of 

his  immense  fortune  to  the  city.    The 

whole   of   his    donations    amount  to  The  W1,dey  Monument-BaWmore.  Maryland 

nearly    seven    millions    of    dollars,    two    millions    of    which    he  devoted  to   the 

establishment  of  one  of  the  finest  hospitals  in  the  world,  for  the  treatment  of  sur- 
____^_  gical  cases  and  general  disease.      The 

site  of  the  old  Maryland  Hospital  was 
purchased  by  Mr.  Hopkins,  and  the  new 
edifice  will  arise  thereon.  Under  the 
supervision  of  the  trustees  of  this  hos- 
pital is  also  an  asylum  for  the  education 
and  maintenance  of  several  hundreds  of- 
colored  orphan  children.  The  remain-  . 
der  of  the  donation  is  devoted  to  the 
establishment  of  a  university  at  Clifton, 
the  beautiful  country  residence  of  Mr. 
Hopkins.  This  university  will  have 
law,  medical,  classical,  and  agricultural 
schools,  and  its  endowment  of 
$4,000,000  with  400  acres  of  land 
should  make  it  one  of  the  most  famous 
sites  of  learning  in  the  country.  Mr. 
Hopkins  died  in  December,  1873.  He 
was  connected  with  almost  all  the  great 

enterprises  that  have  entered  into   the  history   of  Baltimore;    and  from    1847 

until  the   day  of  his  death  was  a  Director  in  the  Baltimore  and  Ohio  Railway 


Entrance  to  Druid  Hill  Park  —  Baltimore,   Maryland. 


762 


THE      CHURCHES      OF      BALTIMORE. 


Company.  When  the  Company  was  fighting  through  the  embarrassments 
which  constantly  crippled  it  until  1857,  ne  often  voluntarily  endorsed  its  notes. 
By  the  liberal  manner  in  which  he  sustained  the  credit  of  the  corporation  the 
completion  and  success  of  the  great  road  were  insured.  Mr.  Hopkins'  interest 
in  the  Company  was  only  exceeded  in  value  by  that  held  by  the  State  of 
Maryland  and  the  city  of  Baltimore.  He  owned  at  one  time  shares  of  the 
stock  whose  actual  market  worth  was  $3,000,000.  He  was  almost  the  controller 
of  the  various  banks  of  Baltimore,  and  a  large  stockholder  in  them  all,  as  well  as 
in  many  of  the  Virginia  banks.  In  1873,  when  the  news  of  the  great  panic  in 
New  York  swept  down  through  the  business  quarter  of  Baltimore,  and  the  alarm 
which  had  been  so  disastrous  in  other  cities  was  about  to  strike  terror  in  the 
Maryland  metropolis,  Mr.  Hopkins  announced  his  determination  to  avert  the 
calamity  from  his  native  town.  He  held  at  that  time  $2,000,000  worth  of 
commercial  paper,  and  had  some  investments  which  were  affected  by  the  sudden 


Scene  on  the  Canal,  near  Harper's  Ferry. 

crisis;  but  he  put  his  shoulder  to  the  wheel,  loaned  his  money  until  it  was 
exhausted,  then  loaned  his  name,  which  was  as  good  as  money,  charging  nothing 
for  it  in  many  cases,  and,  thanks  to  his  generous  efforts,  Baltimore  was  uninjured 
by  the  financial  crisis. 

Prominent  among  the  more  beautiful  churches  of  Baltimore  is  the  superb 
Gothic  structure  near  the  Washington  Monument,  known  as  the  Mount  Vernon 
Place  Methodist  Episcopal  Church,  completed  in  1872.  The  First  Presbyterian 
Church,  on  Madison  and  Park  streets,  built  of  New  Brunswick  freestone  in  the 
pointed  Gothic  style ;  the  Independent  Methodist  Church,  and  the  Eutaw  Place 
Baptist  and  St.  Paul's  Churches,  are  all  imposing  religious  edifices.  The  Masonic 
Temple  on  Charles  street,  and  the  noble  building  which  the  Young  Men's 
Christian  Association  of  Baltimore  is  now  erecting  at  the  corner  of  Charles  and 
Saratoga  streets,  the  former  of  white  marble,  are  substantial  buildings  of  the 
modern    type.       It   is   astonishing   that    Baltimore    is   not  built   entirely  of  this 


DRUID      HILL      PARK. 


763 


The  Bridge  at  Harper's  Ferry. 


marble,  as    there  are   inexhaustible    supplies    of  the   rich    material   within   easy- 
access  of  the  city. 

The  parks  and  suburbs  of  the  "  Liverpool  of  America"  are  on  the  same 
magnificent  scale  as  the  charitable  institutions  and  terminal  facilities.  Druid 
Hill  park  was  purchased  in  i860  for  half  a  million  dollars.  It  is  within  half  a 
mile  of  the  present  city  limits,  and  the  Park  Commissioners  found  the  five 
hundred    acres    which    comprise    it 


already  laid  out;  for  the  Rogers  fam- 
ily, whose  estate  it  once  was,  fashioned 
the  superb  grounds  a  century  ago  into 
the  style  of  the  English  parks  of  the 
period.  Situated  on  the  highest  point 
of  land  near  the  city,  there  are  many 
noble  views  of  the  great  town  and  the 
blue  bay  beyond  ;  downward,  toward 
Kent  Island  and  Annapolis,  and  east- 
ward and  westward,  fertile  valleys 
and  sweet  landscapes  salute  the  eye. 
The  Rogers  family  owned  the  present 
park  for  one  hundred  and  fifty  years,  and  carefully  shielded  many  noble  sylvan 
monarchs  from  the  profanation  of  the  woodman's  axe.  Great  bouquets  and 
masses  of  superb  trees  dot  the  lawns;  antique  woodlands  skirt  the  roadways;  and 
in  autumn  the  rich  orange  and  crimson  of  the  sassafras  and  dogwood  leaves 
contrast  charmingly  with  the  deep  browns  and  purples  of  the  oaks  and  the  gold 
of  the  hickory.* 

From  the  terrace  in  front  of  the  mansion  in  the  centre  of  Druid  Hill  park, 
there  are  many  pretty  glimpses  of  the  city,  the  river,  the  bay ;  and  all  the  country 
may  be  seen  through  lovely  frame-works  of  foliage.  Druid  Hill  was  once 
known  as  the  largest  pear  orchard  either  in  America  or  Europe,  and  on  its  west- 
ern and  south-western  slopes  were  forty  thousand  pear-trees,  with  six  hundred 
varieties  of  that  fruit  upon  them.  A  tract  of  country  has  been  set  apart  for  the 
establishment  of  a  botanical  garden.  From  the  noble  gateway  on  Madison 
avenue  lead  long  walks  and  roads,  adorned  with  ornamental  summer-houses, 
marble  statues,  vases  and  urns ;  water-ways  dotted  with  swans  and  duck- 
lings ;  lawns  across  which  deer  bound  undisturbed,  and  a  lake  whose  icy 
surface  in  winter  is  gay  with  thousands  of  skaters.  On  fine  days  streams  of 
handsome  equipages  wend  their  way  in  procession  to  the  centre  of  the  park, 
where  beauty  and  fashion  pass  in  grand  review.  The  distance  to  the  central 
entrance-gate  at  Druid  Hill  from  Charles  and  Baltimore  streets,  which  are  at 
present  the  most  thickly-populated  portions  of  the  city,  is  two  and  a-half  miles. 
Within  the  bounds  of  the  park  lies  Druid  lake,  a  mighty  stone-wall  reservoir 
which  has  a  storage  capacity  of  493,000  gallons.  This  reservoir  is  only  supple- 
mental, however,  to  the  ample  system  of  city  water-works  which  draw  their 
supplies  from  Lake  Roland,  six  miles  from  the  city,  on  the  Northern  Central 
*See  Weishampel's  "  Stranger  in  Baltimore." 

49 


764 


PARKS,   SQUARES,   AND   SUBURBS. 


railway.  From  this  lake,  which  is  seven  miles  in  circumference,  run  conduits  to 
Hampden  and  Mount  Royal  reservoirs.  The  city  has  recently  purchased,  at  the 
cost  of  $350,000,  the  water  rights  of  the  Great  Gunpowder  river,  and  has  already 
provided  a  supply  of  pure  water  for  a  population  of  a  million  inhabitants.  The 
drives  along  Charles  Street  avenue,  which  leads  from  the  city  six  miles  out  into  a 
lovely  wooded  country  sprinkled  with  fine  villas  and  cottages  to  Lake  Roland, 
to  the  Sheppard  Asylum  for  the  Insane,  and  to  numerous  other  institutions,  are 
all  crowded  in  summer  with  lines  of  carriages  and  pedestrians.  In  Green  Mount 
cemetery,  at  the  junction  of  Belvidere  street  and  North  avenue,  there  are  many 
beautiful  monuments,  and  the  grounds  of  Loudon  park,  Mount  Olivet,  Mount 
Carmel,  and  the  "Western,"  all  within  short  distances  of  the  city,  are  beautifully 
laid  out  and  planted  with  fine  trees. 

Patterson  park,  in  the  eastern  section  of  the  city,  is  but  small  as  compared 
with  its  gigantic  neighbor  of  the  west,  but  has  been  very  handsomely  adorned, 
and  from  it  superb  views  of  the  harbor  and  of  the  mighty  Chesapeake  are  to 
be  had. 

The  proposed  enlargement  of  the  city,  which  now  covers  but  10,000  acres, 
will  embrace  within  Baltimore  limits  Clifton  park,  the  site  of  the  projected 
Hopkins  University,  and  many  pretty  suburban  villages  into  which  manufacturing 
enterprise  has  already  begun  to  penetrate.  In  addition  to  its  parks,  Baltimore 
has  many  beautiful  public  squares  scattered  throughout  the  different  sections. 
In  the  western  portion  are  Union,  Franklin,  and  Harlem  Squares,  all  surrounded 
by  choice  and  commodious  mansions.  In  the  north-west  is  Lafayette  Square ; 
in  the  centre  stands  the  noble  Monument  Square ;  in  the  north-east  and  the 
east  Madison  and  Jackson  Squares  give  shady  refuges  to  the  inhabitants,  and 
the  population  in  the  southern  portion  flies  from  the  summer  heats  to  the  cool 
^ „-____-_  breezes    in    Battery    Square. 

The    extension  of  the  city 
jjj jBjH   H  lljEisl         limits  is  imperatively  demanded 

by  most  of  the  citizens.  The 
inhabitants  are  anxious  to  see 
the  straggling  villages,  located 
within  one  or  two  miles  of 
Baltimore's  boundaries,  com- 
pelled to  contribute  to  the 
support  of  the  metropolis  from 
which  they  derive  so  many 
benefits.  Their  ambition,  also,  to 
rank  Baltimore  as  the  fourth  city 
in  the  United  States  makes  them 
anxious  for  increase  of  popula- 
tion, and  many  favor  the  annexation  of  the  whole  of  Baltimore  county,  thus  giving 
the  city  a  chance  for  indefinite  expansion.  The  old  boundaries  established  by 
legislative  enactment  in  18 16  are  ridiculously  within  the  proper  limits  of  the 
present  metropolis.    Waverley,  a  lively  village  north  of  Baltimore,  and  the  former 


???eSKw? 


View  of  the  Railroad  and  River,  from  the  Mountains  at 
Harper's  Ferry. 


THE  RELAY  HOUSE — MONOCACY.  765 

seat  of  wealthy  Maryland  families  ;  Woodberry,  under  the  shadow  of  Druid  Hill, 
an  extensive  cotton  and  machine  manufacturing  point;  Mount  Washington, 
perched  on  picturesque  hills  within  a  few  minutes'  ride  of  Baltimore  by  the 
Northern  Central  railway ;  Brooklyn,  south-east  of  the  city,  possessing  a  land- 
locked harbor  and  a  water-front  nearly  two  miles  in  length ;  Towsontown, 
Govanstown,  and  Picksville,  the  last  noted  as  the  location  of  one  of  the  earliest 
built  arsenals  of  the  General  Government,  are  all  destined  to  come  under  the 
control  of  Baltimore. 

The  school  system  of  Baltimore  is  admirable,  and  will  compare  favorably 
with  that  of  any  community  in  the  United  States.  The  schools  are  under  the 
control  of  a  board  of  twenty  commissioners,  presided  over  by  one  chosen  from 
their  number  and  by  the  Superintendent  of  Schools  and  his  assistants.  The 
youth  who  passes  through  the  primary  and  grammar  schools  and  the  City 
College  of  Baltimore,  receives  a  liberal  education.  The  total  number  of  pupils 
enrolled  in  the  public  schools  of  the  city  in  1873  was  40,185  ;  and  the  expendi- 
tures for  white  and  colored  schools,  of  which  latter  there  are  at  present  fifteen, 
amounted  to  nearly  $500,000.  The  sexes  are  educated  separately.  The  female 
high  schools  are  the  most  admirable  institutions  of  their  kind  in  the  South,  and 
there  are  few  in  the  North  which  equal  them.  The  Baltimore  City  College, 
which  has  been  granted  $150,000  for  the  erection  of  a  new  building,  has  a  high 
scholastic  standard,  and  is  eminently  prosperous ;  and  the  normal  school  for  the 
education  of  teachers  yearly  sends  forth  many  competent  graduates. 

The  press  of  Baltimore  is  enterprising  in  aiding  to  develop  the  commercial 
greatness  of  the  city.  The  American,  the  Gazette,  and  the  Sun,  all  have  large 
and  finely-equipped  establishments.  The  American  was  founded  in  1773  as  the 
Maryland  Journal  and  Baltimore  Advertiser ;  the  Sun  and  Gazette  are  younger. 
The  Bulletin  is  a  literary  journal  of  much  excellence.  In  Baltimore  is  also  the 
office  of  the  Southern  Magazine,  the  only  monthly  periodical  of  any  importance 
issued  in  the  South. 

Leaving  Baltimore  by  the  Baltimore  and  Ohio  railroad,  and  crossing  over 
Gwynn's  Falls,  on  the  superb  Carrollton  viaduct,  the  traveler  will  find  at  almost 
every  turn  a  profusion  of  bold  and  romantic  scenery.  At  Washington  Junction, 
formerly  known  as  the  Relay  House,  a  fine  hotel  has  been  erected  by  the  railway 
company ;  and  in  summer  hundreds  of  youths  and  maidens,  from  Washington 
and  Baltimore,  angle  for  trout  and  for  each  other's  hearts  beside  the  little  stream 
which  comes  down  from  the  mountains. 

From  the  Thomas  viaduct,  the  noble  granite  structure  which  spans  the 
stream  sixty-six  feet  above  its  bed,  one  can  see  the  pretty  village  of  Elkridge 
Landing.  Time  was  when  vessels  of  small  tonnage  from  London  used  to  come 
up  the  stream,  which  now  would  scarcely  float  a  skiff,  and  anchor  at  Elkridge 
Landing  to  be  loaded  with  tobacco. 

At  Ellicott's  Mills,  a  charming  old  town,  the  Patapsco  river  runs  through  a 
bold  and  rocky  passage,  and  from  the  railroad  one  may  see  the  huge  mass  of 
granite  known  as  the  Tarpeian  Rock.  At  Mount  Airy  and  at  Frederick  Junction 
there  are  many  fine  out-looks  over  the  fertile  valleys  and  broken  hills.    At  Frede- 


766  HARPER'S      FERRY,      WESTERN     VIRGINIA. 

rick  Junction,  or  as  it  is  better  known,  Monocacy,  one  may  visit  the  battle-ground 
where  General  Lew.  Wallace  made  his  gallant  stand  at  the  Monocacy  bridge,  on 
the  9th  of  July,  1.864,  arjd  prevented  the  enemy  from  making  a  victorious 
advance  upon  Washington. 

From  Frederick  Junction  a  branch  line  of  rail  communicates  with  Frederick 
City,  a  well  built  town  with  broad,  straight  streets,  bordered  with  stone  mansions, 
and  possessing  many  handsome  churches  and  flourishing  educational  institutions. 
From  Monocacy  the  Baltimore  and  Ohio  railroad  traverses  the  beautiful  valley 
lying  between  the  Monocacy  river  and  the  Catoctin  mountains.  At  Point  of 
Rocks,  a  bold  promontory  formed  by  the  profile  of  the  Catoctin  mountain, 
whose  base  is  washed  by  the  Potomac  on  the  Maryland  side,  the  railroad  passes 
through  a  tunnel  drilled  fifteen  hundred  feet  into  the  solid  rock.  It  traverses 
the  battle-field  at  South  Mountain,  running  at  the  foot  of  a  precipice  for  three  or 
four  miles,  and,  passing  Hagerstown  Junction,  enters  the  great  gorge  at  Harper's 
Ferry. 

Thomas  Jefferson  immortalized  Harper's  Ferry  by  his  words  as  John  Brown 
did  by  his  deeds.  The  rock  on  which  Jefferson  is  said  to  have  sat  when  he 
wrote  his  "Notes  on  Virginia"  commands  a  fine  view  of  the  junction  of  the 
Potomac  and  the  Shenandoah  rivers,  in  the  great  gorge  which  forms  one  of 
the  most  picturesque  bits  of  mountain  scenery  in  the  South.  On  either  side 
of  the  eminence  known  as  Cemetery  Hill,  on  which  Jefferson's  Rock  stands, 
rise  up  majestic  mountains,  rugged  and  difficult  of  access — the  Maryland  and 
Loudon  Heights.  The  Maryland  hills  rise  to  2,000  feet  above  the  level  of 
the  sea,  and  the  others  are  still  clad  in  primitive  forests,  where  the  foot  of  man 
seldom  treads.     The    Potomac,    which  rises    in    Western    Virginia,    and    rushes 


Jefferson's  Rock,  Harper's  Ferry. 


impetuously,  like  some  mountain  sprite,  down  through  the  Alleghanies,  traverses 
the  northern  extremity  of  the  valleys  of  West  Virginia,  and  forms  the  boundary 
between  that  State  and   Maryland. 


harper's    ferry's    location    and    history. 


767 


On  the  rugged  cliffs  are  various  fancied  shapes  and  faces,  and  travelers  are 
invited  to  discover,  in  a  rock  on  the  Maryland  side,  a  fanciful  and  certainly  feeble 
resemblance  to  George  Washington. 

The  village  of  Harper's  Ferry,  before  the  war,  contained  3,000  population,  and 
was  the  site  of  a  national  armory,  for  which  the  immense  water  power  rendered 
it  valuable.  When  the  late  war  broke  out  many  of  the  old  inhabitants  cast 
their  lot  with  the  Confederacy,  but  great  numbers  also  sided  with  the  Govern- 
ment of  the  Union.  The  population  has  been  materially  changed,  and  to-day 
is  composed  of  1,600  whites  and  700  blacks.  The  Baltimore  and  Ohio  railroad 
has  pushed  its  tracks  across  the  Potomac  at  this  point  on  a  magnificent  bridge, 
and  the  Winchester  and  Potomac  railway  has  its  northern  terminus  at  Harper's 


Cumberland  Narrows  and  Mountains. 

Ferry.  The  scenery  along  the  Chesapeake  and  Ohio  canal,  whose  banks  the 
line  of  railway  follows  for  many  miles  between  Harper's  Ferry  and  Washington, 
and  by  the  rugged  edges  of  the  great  cliffs  westward  from  the  little  mountain 
town,  is  exceedingly  fine.  In  summer  a  ride  on  the  banks  of  this  canal  affords 
a  constant  succession  of  delicious  landscapes,  still-life  pictures,  and  sweet  vistas 
of  romantic  v/oodlands. 

Harper's  Ferry  was  named  after  Mr.  Robert  Harper,  a  native  of  Oxford  in 
England,  who  established  th.e  first  ferry  over  the  Potomac  in  the  mountains,  and 
who  was  shrewd  enough  to  join  the  American  colonists  when  they  made  their 
strike  for  freedom.  The  Ferry  is  said  to  have  been  chosen  as  the  site  of  a 
national  armory,  in  1794,  by   General  Washington  himself.     The  establishments 


768 


REMINISCENCES     OF     WAR. 


there  were  very  extensive,  and  their  ruins — for  the  buildings  were  burned  during 
the  war — extend  for  a  long  distance  beside  the  tracks  of  the  Baltimore  and  Ohio 
railroad. 

In  the  little  engine-house,  still  pointed  out  from  the  platform  of  the  depot  of 
the  railway  station,  John  Brown  made  his  defense  against  the  excited  inhabitants 
and  the  Virginian  militia  when  he  was  inaugurating  his  raid  for  the  purpose  of 
liberating  the  slaves  of  Virginia.  The  engine-house  is  a  small  brick  building 
near  the  old  armory  gate,  and  the  Government  would  do  well  to  see  that  it  is 
preserved  as  an  historical  memorial,  for  around  it  and  from  it  was  fought  the 
first  battle  of  the  great  war  which  finally  raged  for  four  years  throughout  the 
South. 

Not  far  from  Harper's  Ferry,  on  the  Winchester  and  Potomac  railroad,  is  the 
little  hamlet  of  Charlestown,  where  John  Brown  was  executed  under  the  laws  of 
the  State  of  Virginia  in  1859.  Early  in  1861  the  armory  buildings  were  burned, 
together  with  fifteen  thousand  stand  of  arms  stored  in  them,  to  prevent  the 
Confederates  from  profiting  by  their  capture,  and  the  Southern  forces  soon  took 
possession  of  Harper's  Ferry.  Throughout  the  war  it  was  occupied  and 
re-occupied  by  the  Union  forces ;  the  heights  around  glistened  with  bayonets ; 
and  the  town  has  not  yet  fairly  recovered  from  the  demoralization  consequent 
on  its  unfortunate  condition  during  the  civil  struggle.  Harper's  Ferry  was  long 
the  base  of  supplies  for  the  armies  of  Banks  and  Fremont  when  they  were 
operating  against  Stonewall  Jackson  in  the  Valley.  In  September  of  1862 
there  was  a  grand  artillery  duel  between  the  opposing  forces  stationed  on  the 
heights,  when  Jackson  and  Hill  attacked  Harper's  Ferry  with  their  army  corps. 
On  that  occasion  the  Maryland  heights  were  abandoned  by  a  Federal  officer,  who 

was  cashiered  for  his  misconduct, 
but  killed  by  a  shell  shortly  after 
he  had  given  the  order  for  the 
surrender  of  Harper's  Ferry  to  the 
Confederates. 

The  scene  on  the  whole  peninsula 
formed  by  the  Potomac  and  Shenan- 
doah, at  the  time  that  McClellan's 
army  was  concentrated  about  Har- 
per's Ferry,  has  been  described  as 
exceedingly  fine.  All  the  heights 
were  aglow  with  thousands  of  watch- 
fires,  and  from  Camp  Hill,  a  ridge  di- 
viding the  villages  of  Harper's  Ferry 
and  Bolivar,  one  could  hear  the  hum 
of  voices,  like  the  murmur  of  the 
ocean,  rising  up  from  the  valleys  and 

Cumberland  Viaduct,  Maryland.  drifting    dQyfn    {rQm     ^  mountains. 

The  village  clusters  picturesquely  among  the  sides  of  the  steep  hills ;    no  hum 
of  spindles  or  plying  of  hammers  disturbs  its  primitive  quiet.      An  ancient  flight 


FROM     HARPER'S     FERRY     TO     PITTSBURG. 


769 


of  stone  steps  leads  up  to  a  quaint  church  on  the  hill-side,  and  beyond  the  path 
conducts  the  visitor  to  Jefferson's  Rock.  Hardly  a  quarter  of  a  mile  from  the 
engine-house  where  John  Brown  struck  the  first  blow  for  the  freedom  of  the 
American  slave,  rise  the  walls  of  Storer  College,  an  institution  endowed  by 
private  munificence  for  the  education  of  freedmen,  and  sending  out  every  year, 
competent  teachers  of  both  sexes,  who  labor  to  educate  the  colored  race. 

A  short  distance  to  the  west,  beyond  Harper's  Ferry,  the  Baltimore  and  Ohio 
railroad  passes  through  a  projecting  rock  in  a  tunnel  eighty  feet  long,  whence  a 
magnificent  view  of  the  pass  through  the  mountains  to  the  confluence  of  the 
Potomac  and  Shenandoah  is  presented.  The  road  also  passes  through  Kearneys- 
ville  in  West  Virginia,  the  scene  of  many  sharp  cavalry  fights  between  Generals 
Pleasanton,  Averill,  Custer,  and  Merritt  with  the  Confederates  under  Fitz  Lee 
and  Stewart,  and  within  seven  miles  of  Sharpsburg,  whence  the  tourist  can 
reach  the  celebrated   battle-field  of  Antietam. 


Harper's  Ferry,  Maryland. 

Sharpsburg  bears  many  marks  of  the  great  fight  of  1862,  and  near  the  battle- 
field is  a  monument  to  the  slaughter  of  those  dread  September  days,  in  the 
shape  of  a  fine  national  cemetery. 

Martinsburg,  in  West  Virginia,  on  the  line  of  the  Baltimore  and  Ohio  railroad, 
was  the  scene  of  many  Confederate  raids,  but  is  now  a  prosperous  town,  whose 
chief  reliance  is  upon  the  extensive  iron  works  established  there  by  the  railroad 
company.  At  St.  John's  Run  travelers  leave  the  rail  for  Berkley  Springs,  a 
favorite  summer  resort  at  the  eastern  base  of  the  Warm  Spring  Ridge  in  West 
Virginia.  At  Cumberland  one  enters  into  the  mountain  region  of  the  narrow 
western  part  of  Maryland,  and  into  the  magnificent  valley  from  which  Baltimore 
draws  its  enormous  coal  trade.  Cumberland  is  a  handsome  town  with  many  fine 
churches  and  banks.  It  lies  in  a  noble  amphitheatre  of  mountains,  and  all  around 
it  and  beyond  it  the  scenery  is  very  picturesque. 


77o 


THE     ALLEGHANIES — CHEAT      RIVER RINGWOOD     TUNNEL. 


At  Piedmont,  twenty- eight  miles  beyond  Cumberland,  the  foot  of  the  Alle- 
ghanies  is  reached,  and  the  road,  climbing  the  mountains,  passes  Altamont  on 
the  extreme  summit  of  the  Alleghany  ridge,  where  the  streams  divide,  flowing  in 
one  direction  toward  the  Gulf  of  Mexico,  and  the  other  toward  the  Atlantic ;  then 
passes  by  pretty  Oakland,  a  famous  resort  for  summer  tourists,  and  descends 
rapidly  along  high  and  precipitous  embankments  to  the  banks  of  the  Cheat  river, 
a  turbulent  mountain  stream,  whose  waters  are  of  sombre  hue. 

For  many  miles  beyond  the  Cheat  river  the  road  winds  down  the  steep  sides 
of  the  mountains,  and,  entering  the  great  Western  coal-fields,  passes  through  the 
Ringwood  tunnel,  4,100  feet  long,  and  completed  at  the  end  of  five  years'  labor 
at  a  cost  of  a  million  dollars.  From  the  tunnel  at  Newburg,  in  Western  Virginia, 
the  railway  line  descends  a  steep  hill-side,  and  thence  finds  its  way  through  a 
country  rich  in  coal  and  petroleum,  but  only  sprinkled  here  and  there  by  small 
and  uninteresting  villages,  to  Pittsburg,  on  the  Ohio  river. 

The  old  town  of  Annapolis,  on  the  Severn,  near  Chesapeake,  still  the  capital 
of  Maryland,  is  the  seat  of  the  United  States  Naval  Academy,  established  there 
in  1845.  It  was  founded  in  1649,  and  in  1708,  in  honor  of  Queen  Anne,  its 
name  was  changed  from  Anne  Arundel  Town  to  the  present  one.  It  was  at 
Annapolis  that  General  Washington  resigned  his  commission  at  the  close  of  the 
Revolution.  The  State-House,  and  St.  John's  College,  founded  in  1784,  are  the 
only  important  public  buildings. 

The  present  debt  of  the  State,  over  and  above  its  assets,  is  $6,219,172;  but 
when  the  indebtedness  of  the  Chesapeake  and  Ohio  Canal  Company  to  the 
commonwealth,  which  amounts  to  more  than  twenty  million  dollars,  is  trans- 
ferred from  the  schedule  of  unproductive  assets  to  that  of  interest-paying 
securities,  a  fund  will  be  furnished  by  which  the  entire  State  debt  can  be  taken 
up.  The  last  Legislature  appropriated  $50,000  for  the  establishment  of  schools 
for  colored  children,  and  a  colored  normal  school  is  in  excellent  condition. 


Old  John  Cupid,  a  Negro  Herb  Doctor. 


LXXXVI. 


SOUTHERN      CHARACTERISTICS — STATE      PRIDE  —  THE       INFLUENCE 
OF     RAILROADS-— POOR     WHITES — THEIR     HABITS. 


WHILE  I  cannot  agree  with  the  amiable  gentleman  in  Savannah  who  one 
day  assured  me  that  the  people  of  the  North  and  South  were  two 
distinct  nations,  and  that  the  time  would  come  when  they  would  separate,  I 
still  recognize  essential  differences  between  the  inhabitants  of  the  Northern  and 
Southern  States.  These  differences  are  not  merely  climatic ;  they  were  inbred 
by  the  system  and  tendencies  which  have  been  so  lately  done  away  with. 
Between  the  citizen  of  Massachusetts  and  the  dweller  in  South  Carolina  a  broad 
and  deep  gulf  so  long  existed,  that  it  is  not  strange  that  the  habits,  the 
customs,  and  the  language  of  the  people  should 
differ  in  many  particulars. 

The  first  thing,  however,  which  strikes  the 
stranger  as  peculiar  in  visiting  the  Southern 
States  is  that  the  inhabitants  of  each  State  have 
remarkably  distinguishing  characteristics. 
Because  one  knows  the  Virginian  character  he 
cannot  safely  draw  inferences  as  to  that  of  the 
South  Carolinian;  because  he  has  studied  the 
types  in  the  bayou  regions  of  Louisiana  he  can- 
not presume  to  a  knowledge  of  the  Mississippian 
of  the  Gulf  coast.  In  short,  the  variety  of  origin 
and  ancestry  in  the  Southern  States  has  left 
indelible  marks  upon  the  populations. 

People  in  all  the  States,  however,,  take  what 
seems  to  Northern  men,  and  also  to  the  Euro- 
pean, overweening  pride  in  their  State,  their 
county,  and  even  the  immediate  neighborhood 
in  which  they  were  born.  Nothing  is  more  common  than  to  hear  a  Southerner 
announce  himself,  on  being  introduced,  as  from  a  certain  county,  and  he  will 
very  likely  add  that  it  is  a  section  famed  for  certain  excellences  and  for  the 
valor  of  its  inhabitants.  This  is  not  said  from  any  motives  of  self-conceit, 
because  the  same  man  who  vaunts  the  virtues  of  his  neighbors  will  willingly 
compare  himself  unfavorably  with  them ;  but  it  is  due  to  a  genuine  love  and 
a  deep-seated  affection  for  the  soil.  The  Southerners  have  been  so.  long 
emphatically  an  agricultural  people,  and  have  conquered  at  such  expense  and 
with  such  difficulty  a  great  portion  of  the  land  which  belongs  to  them,  that  they 


Southern  Types  —  Come  to  Market 


772 


THE   SOUTHERNER'S   ATTACHMENT  TO   HIS   STATE, 


love  it  with  an  intensity  and  devotion  equaled  in  the  world  only  by  the  attach- 
ment of  the  Swiss  peasant  to  his  peaks  and  the  Frenchman  to  his  vineyard. 

The  railroads  which  now  penetrate  the  South  in  every  direction,  and  the 
prosaic  yet  cosmopolitan  "  through  routes  "  which,  to  Southern  eyes,  dash  with 
such  irreverent  lack  of  compunction  across  State  boundaries,  and  annihilate  so 
recklessly  all  local  sentiment,  are  doubtless  doing  much  to  annul  the  devotion  to 
State  rights.  Curious  travelers  in  the  South  have  remarked  that,  as  fast  as  a 
railroad  penetrates  a  section,  sentiment  with  regard  to  matters  in  the  outside 
world  becomes  liberalized  along  the  line.  The  current  of  through  travel  pouring 
over  the  great  roadways  from  New  York  to  New  Orleans,  and  from  the  West  and 
St.  Louis  to  the  Atlantic  coast,  has  done  much  to  shake  that  isolated  indepen- 
dence once  so  conspicuous  in  the  Southerner  of  the  country  regions,  and  to  render 
him  more  like  his  bustling  and  active  fellow- citizen  of  the  North  and  West. 

However  much  the  hundred  railroads  covering  the  South  with  an  iron  net- 
work may  do  to  destroy  the  old  and  too  earnest  attachment  of  each  individual 


iiiiitiiJMi 


Southern  Types — A  Southern  Plough  Team. 

to  his  particular  State  and  neighborhood,  that  attachment  will  still  remain  for 
many  years  one  of  the  salient  points  of  Southern  character.  Two  gentlemen 
meeting  upon  a  railway  train  often  introduce  themselves  something  after  this 
fashion  : 

"  Are  you  from  this  State,  sir?" 

"No,  sir,  I  am  from  Kentucky,  sir,"  or  "Tennessee,  sir,"  as  the  case  maybe; 
whereupon  the  first  interlocutor  immediately  defines  his  nativity,  and  the  two 
enter  into  an  amicable  discussion  of  political  and  social  issues.  It  is  not  unusual 
for  strangers  thus  meeting  to  inquire  of  each  other  the  counties  and  even  the 
towns  in  which  they  were  respectively  born,  and  from  the  gravity  and  dignity  of 
their  conversation,  and  the  evident  pride  which  each  takes  in  detailing  the 
advantages  and  peculiar  blessings  of  his  neighborhood,  one  might  fancy  them 
a  couple  of  foreigners  from  distant  lands  who  had  accidentally  met.  As  a  rule, 
two  Southerners  traveling  in  a  State  remote  from  that  in  which  they  were  born 
find  an  instant  bond  of  communion  in  the  fact  that  they  are  from  the  same 
commonwealth. 


THE     TWO      OLD     CLASSES     IN     THE     SOUTH. 


773 


Sometimes  one  sees  on  the  cars  or  on  the  steamers  a  tall,  lank  Southerner 
anxiously  inquiring  if  there  be  among  the  passengers  any  one  from  his  native 
State ;  and  if  he  finds  such  a  one,  he  goes  to  him  with  effusive  friendship  and 
adopts  him  as  his  comrade.  A  friend  has  told  me  a  curious  incident  of  this  kind 
which  he  saw  in  a  rough  part  of  the  South-west.  While  traveling  on  an  obscure 
railroad  in  some  forest,  the  car  door  opened;  and  a  lank  individual  thrust  his  coun- 
tenance through  the  aperture,  crying  out  in  an  appealing  manner:  "Is  there 
any  one  heah  from  Tennessee?"  No  response  being  made,  his  voice  was 
presently  heard  repeating  the  same  inquiry  in  the  neighboring  car. 

There  are,  of  course,  several  important  facts  to  bear  in  mind  when  one  is 
judging  of  the  peculiarities  of  the  Southern   people.      It  should  be  remembered 


Southern  Types  —  Negro  Boys  Shelling  Peas. 

that  there  were  but  two  classes  in  the  South  under  the  old  system,  the  high  up 
and  the  low  down,  Dives  in  his  hall  and  Lazarus  among  the  dogs  at  the  gate, — 
the  gentleman  planter  and  the  ruffian,  brawling,  ill-educated,  and  generally 
miserable  poor  white.  The  negro  did  not  count;  he  was  a  commodity,  an 
article  of  barter,  classed  familiarly  as  "nigger;"  had  no  identity;  was  supposed 
to  possess  little  consciousness,  moral  or  otherwise;  and  while  practically  he  was 
every  now  and  then  treated  with  great  kindness  and  forbearance  by  those  who 
were  his  absolute  masters,  still  he  did  nothing  either  to  build  up  or  solidify  society. 
Now-a-days  a  middle  class  is  gradually  springing  into  existence,  bridging  the 
once  impassable  gulf  between  the  "high  up"  and  the  "low  down,"  and  some  of  the 


774  THE    "pore    white      en    voyage. 

more  intelligent  and  respectable  negroes  are  taking  rank  in  this  class.  The  low 
down  element  has  perhaps  received  more  benefit  from  the  results  of  the  war  than 
has  the  negro  or  his  master. 

The  introduction  of  manufactures  here  and  there  in  the  South  has  drawn  into 
large  towns  some  of  the  white  population  which  was  once  utterly  useless  and 
degraded.  A  noteworthy  instance  which  I  have  already  mentioned  is  that  of  the 
hundreds  of  cleanly  and  handsome  girls  in  the  cotton-mills  of  Georgia.  Many 
of  them  have  been  transformed  from  slouching,  unkempt,  and  gawky  country 
girls  into  tidy  and  thrifty  operatives,  with  some  little  money  in  bank,  and 
prospects  of  a  social  position  far  higher  than  they  could  ever  have  hoped  to 
gain  under  the  old  system. 

The  poor  white  still  clings  to  many  of  his  eccentricities.  One  finds  an 
excellent  chance  to  observe  the  peculiar  habits  of  this  class  by  traveling 
with  the  great  current  of  emigration  from  Alabama,  Georgia,  and  Mississippi 
south-westward  to  Arkansas  and  Texas.  Now  and  then,  in  our  long  journeys 
from  one  end  of  the  South  to  the  other,  we  fell  in  with,  and  traveled  for  days  in 
the  company  of,  representatives  of  what  was  formerly  the  low  down  class.  We 
chatted  in  the  friendliest  and  freest  manner  with  the  pretty,  soft-voiced  girls  from 
Alabama,  as  we  rode  across  the  great  plains  of  Texas,  and  were  no  whit  deterred 
from  conversation  by  the  fact  that  they  dipped  long  pine  sticks  in  yellow  snuff, 
and  chewed  the  sticks  while  they  talked  with  us.  Sometimes,  however,  we  felt 
like  remonstrating  with  the  mothers  who  gave  their  children  sticks  from  the 
family  snuff-bottle,  and  taught  them  the  disgusting  habit. 

The  men  were  almost  without  exception  clad  in  homespun  garments  of  a 
blue  or  butternut  color,  always  neatly  made.  A  slouch  hat  was  their  invari- 
able head-gear — a  hat,  too,  which  seemed  to  have  undergone  more  than  the 
ordinary  vicissitudes,  which  one  could  never  imagine  to  have  had  band  or 
buckle  or  definite  color — a  hat  much  battered  by  the  elements,  and  occa- 
sionally perforated  with  buckshot.  Out  of  ten  thousand  people  of  this  class, 
not  one  had  in  his  face  a  particle  of  color;  all  had  the  same  dead,  pallid 
complexion.  The  women  whom  we  saw,  and  who  were  doubtless  fair  speci- 
mens of  their  class,  were,  when  young,  quite  pretty;  gracious,  but  exceedingly 
timid.  On  the  whole,  when  the  snuff-stick  was  laid  by,  and  their  lustrous 
brown  eyes  were  playing  at  hide-and-seek  with  thought,  they  seemed  charming 
as  Italian  peasant  girls,  or  maids  of  Marseilles ;  but  when  from  their  sweet 
lips  came  the  fiat  and  harsh  accents  of  their  native  mountains  and  plains,  the 
illusion  was   dispelled. 

My  observation  justifies  me  in  the  conclusion  that  the  poor  white  always 
has  a  numerous  family.  It  was  not  at  all  uncommon  to  see  lean  fathers 
and  lank  and  scrawny  mothers  entering  the  cars,  followed  by  a  brood  of 
ten  or  more  children  of  all  sizes.  There  was  something  touching,  too,  in  the 
rough  sympathy  and  helpfulness  of  the  members  of  these  families  one  for 
another,  during  their  long  and  weary  journeys.  The  little  girls,  whose  thin  but 
pretty  faces  were  hidden  beneath  sun-bonnets,  and  the  rough  boys,  with  fists  like 
sledge-hammers,  and  faces  drawn  down  with  wrinkles  of  fever  and  ague,  each 


POOR.     WHITES      AS      FELLOW-TRAVELERS. 


775 


carried  some  bundle  of  household  gear ;  the  mother  usually  bore  a  basket 
containing  a  ham,  some  coarse  corn-bread,  and,  mayhap,  a  package  of  fruit,  as 
well  as  the  snuff-bottle;  and  the  father  bore  the  family  rifle,  its  long  barrels 
weather-stained  and  rusty. 

The  ignorance  and  timidity  of  these  poor  people,  during  their  journeys 
to  new  homes,  was  painful  as  well  as  ludicrous  to  witness.  Sometimes  a  family 
on  entering  a  car  would  stand  utterly  bewildered,  not  seeming  to  know  whether 
to  sit  or  slink  into  a  corner,  until  the  conductor,  or  the  "captain,"  as  he  is  called 
in  the  South,  marshaled  them  to  seats.  On  one  occasion,  being  startled  by  the 
pressure  of  a  brawny  hand  on  my  shoulder,  I  turned  to  confront  the  father  of  an 
interesting  family  of  eleven,  who,  pointing  to  his  wife,  said  in  a  hoarse  whisper : 

"  Stranger,  the  captain  did  n't  give  her  no  yaller  ticket ;  I  reckon  he  done 
forgot." 

Then  showing  me  the  yellow  check  which  the  conductor  had  given  him 
in  return  for  his  ticket,  he  earnestly  inquired  the  meaning  of  the  lettering 
upon  it.  Surprised  that  a  man  whose  appearance 
indicated  intelligence  of  no  mean  order  could  not 
read,  I  ventured  to  ask  him  if  such  was  the  case,  and 
if  his  family  was  unable  to  read  or  write.  I  found  that  no 
member  of  the  party  had  the  slightest  acquaintance  with 
anything  educational,  and  that  in  the  whole  course  of 
half  a  century  of  toil,  the  old  man  had  rarely  been  more 
than  ten  miles  from  home.  Now  he  was  about  to  try 
the  far-away  plains  of  Texas,  and  he  looked  forward  to 
it  as  a  mighty  change.  The  future  seemed  a  great  gulf 
before  him,  and  he  informed  me,  with  the  ghost  of  a  sigh, 
as  he  shifted  his  tobacco  from  one  cheek  to  the  other, 
that  he  never  would  have  believed  "befo'  the  surrendah" 
that  he  could  have  undertaken  a  wholesale  emigration. 

Few  people  who  have  not  wandered  up  and  down  the 
highways  and  byways  of  the  South  can  ^appreciate  the 
immensity  of  the  emigration  from  the  old  cotton  States  to 
the  extreme  South-west.  That  Texas  will  speedily  have 
a  vast  population,  drawn  from  these  cotton  States,  and  bitterly  necessitous  in 
matters  of  education  and  elevation,  there  is  no  doubt.  The  destiny  of  these 
poor  whites,  who  have  fled  before  the  changed  order  of  things  in  their  homes,  is 
somewhat  uncertain.  If  they  could  but  acquire  habits  of  solid  industry,  and 
learn  to  accumulate  in  their  rough  way  some  little  surplus  means,  they  might 
easily  be  redeemed  from  their  present  degraded  condition ;  but  Texas  is  vast,  the 
means  of  living  easily  to  be  had  there,  and  so  it  is  to  be  feared  that  the  mass 
of  the  poor  white  race  will  be  improved  in  little  except  its  material  condi- 
tion. Those  who  remain  at  home  are  certainly,  as  I  have  said,  improving  as 
a  whole ;  yet  the  Sand-hillers  of  South  Carolina,  the  Crackers  of  Georgia  and 
Florida,  the  wretched  masses  along  the  lowlands  of  the  Atlantic  coast, 
and  the   mountaineers  in   some  portions  of  Virginia,   Eastern  Tennessee,  and 


Southern  Types — A  "Likely 
Girl"  with  her  Baby. 


776 


OTHER     PHASES     OF     STATE     PRIDE. 


Western  North  Carolina,  present  many  discouraging  signs.  In  some  cases,  they 
do  not  advance  as  rapidly  as  does  the  negro ;  but  the  latter,  immediately  after 
the  war,  had  a  great  incentive  to  a  rapid  growth,  and  it  was  to  be  expected  that 

he  would  improve  his  newly-acquired 
opportunity.  I  do  not  think  the  mass 
of  poor  whites  really  appreciated  the 
immense  difference  which  the  war 
effected  in  their  social  position,  nor 
will  they  thoroughly  understand  it  for 
many  years  to  come — not  until  the 
progress  of  events  under  the  new 
regime  has  wiped  out  the  old  aristoc- 
racy, and  brought  its  genuine  leveling 
influence  wholly  to  bear.  Should 
immigration  make  as  great  progress 
in  the  other  States  of  the  South  as  it 
is  now  making  in  Virginia,  there  will, 
of  course,  be  a  radical  change  in  the 
character  of  the  poor  white  population. 
We  may  expect  in  a  few  years,  as  the 
country  fills  up,  and  the  persistent 
idlers  are  crowded  to  the  wall,  to  see 
the  Southern  poor  white  transformed 
into  an  industrious  and  valuable  raera- 


Southern  Types  —  Catching  his  Breakfast. 


"ber  of  society.  The  pride  of  State,  heretofore  alluded  to,  has  doubtless  made  it 
much  harder  for  the  native  Southerner  to  emigrate  than  it  would  have  been 
for  citizens  of  other  sections.  I  shall  not  readily  forget  the  intense  delight  with 
which  a  Mississippian,  returning  from  a  disastrous  colonization  experiment  in 
Brazil,  hailed  the  bluffs  and  the  rose- embowered  gardens  of  beautiful  Natchez 
as  we  drew  near  to  them  one  spring  evening. 

"Thar,"  he  said,  "is  ez  good  a  country  ez  the  sun  shines  on,  and  if  all  them 
cussed  fools  as  went  to  the  Brazils  was  hyar  now,  they  would  say  so  too.  Give 
me  old  Mississippi  in  mine." 

The  affection  for  the  State  as  distinguished  from  the  section  was  shown 
all  through  the  late  war.  When  we  were  called  upon  to  listen  to  the  recital 
of  battles,  in  which,  by  the  way,  it  was  noteworthy  that  the  Confederates  always 
won,  we  remarked  the  pride  and  dignity  with  which  the  superior  excellences  of 
any  special  State  in  question  were  asserted.  In  fact,  we  learned  to  believe  that 
the  Southerner  often  thinks,  as  the  Englishman  said  of  all  Americans,  that 
""he  is  as  good  as  any  one  else,  and  better  too." 


.  LXXXVII. 

THE  CARRYING  OF  WEAPONS  —  MORAL  CHARACTER  OF  THE 

NEGROES. 


SOME  people  are  inclined  to  place  a  good  deal  of  stress  upon  the  supposed 
fact  that  the  mass  of  Southern  males  carry  weapons,  and  that  their  sense 
of  honor  is  so  highly  wrought  that  their  conversation  is  guarded.  While  it  must 
be  admitted  that  great  numbers  of  Southerners  habitually  go  armed,  and  that 
in  some  States  they  are  prone  to  fight  on  small  provocation,  my  experience 
has  been  that  the  most  cultured  and  refined  gentlemen  rarely  bear  a  weapon, 
and  scoff  at  the  idea  of  the  necessity  of  carrying  one. 
In  our  journeys,  we  traveled  not  unfrequently  in  regions 
remote  from  the  railroads,  or  along  rivers,  where  the 
people  were  somewhat  rough,  but  never  on  any  occasion 
did  we  see  pistol  or  knife  drawn  or  displayed  during  our 
fourteen  months'  stay  in  the  South. 
While,  however,  we  never  saw 
weapons  displayed,  we  heard  plenty 
of  stories  to  confirm  the  impression 
that  large  classes  carried  them  and 
used  them  freely. 

There  is  no  doubt  that  a  great 
proportion  of  the  Southern  people 
believe  that  they  must  avenge  any 
fancied  slight  upon  their  honor  by 
personal  punishment  of  the  indi- 
vidual who  has  offered  it,  and  so 
they  have  recourse  to  the  revolver 
and  the  knife,  where  the  Northern 
man  would  carry  the  case  into  the 
courts.  The  worst  phase  of  the 
Southern  character  is  illustrated  in 
the    unwillingness    to   adopt   legal 

methods    in    the    Settlement    Of     dis-  Southern  Types— Negro  Shoeblacks. 

putes.  Under  the  regime  of  reconstruction  the  juries  of  the  Federal  Courts 
are  detested,  appeals  to  them  being  considered  a  greater  ignominy  than  those 
to  the  State  Courts.  The  higher  class  of  gentlemen  rarely  settle  disputes  by 
shooting  or  stabbing,  but  it  is  probable  that  the  only  thing  which  will  restrain  the 
rougher  whites  from  a  practice  unworthy  of  our  civilization,  and  from  ideas  of 


Jj8  NEGROES     CARRY      SHOT-GUNS. 

personal  satisfaction  which  are  alike  murderous  and  contemptible,  will   be  the 
progress  of  education. 

It  is,  perhaps,  too  true  that  the  recent  accession  of  the  Democrats  to  power 
in  Texas  and  Arkansas  has  increased  the  number  of  misdeeds  there.  That  the 
Democratic  party  in  the  South  is  the  party  of  law  and  order  is  by  no  means 
strictly  true ;  the  leaders  of  the  Democratic  party  are  unfortunately  people  of 
inflammable  methods  of  speech,  and  often,  in  the  excitement  of  political 
harangues,  give  advice  which  their  rude  followers  interpret  to  suit  themselves,, 
and  which  sometimes  results  in  bloodshed.  The  public,  however,  should  be 
extremely  careful  not  to  judge  of  the  Southern  character  by  the  greatly  exagger- 
ated accounts  of  outrages  with  which  many  political  newspapers  are  filled  during 
the  progress  of  a  campaign.  The  fact  that  in  a  journey  of  25,000  miles,  nearly 
a  thousand  of  which  I  traveled  on  horseback,  through  mountain  regions,  I 
saw  no  weapons  drawn,  and  not  a  single  instance  of  assault,  lynching,  or  even 
drunken  brawls,  ought  to  be  considered  as  good  testimony  in  favor  of  the 
Southerners.  The  Northern  people  in  their  judgment  are  too  apt  to  confuse 
the  classes,  and  it  is  undoubtedly  true  that  in  some  parts  of  the  North  prejudiced 
persons  still  fancy  the  South  a  barbarous  region  infested  with  ruffians  of  the  old 
border  type. 

The  negroes  certainly  rejoice  in  the  possession  of  weapons  to  a  large  extent. 
Since  the  war  every  black  man  has  felt  himself  called  upon  to  own  a  shot-gun, 
but  to  his  credit  be  it  said  that  very  rarely  in  his  history  as  a  freedman  has  he 
been  guilty  of  the  murder  of  white  people  for  purposes  of  vengeance.  He  is 
deterred  in  a  large  measure  from  the  greater  crimes  to  which  his  ignorant  condi- 
tion and  lack  of  moral  training  may  impel  him  by  the  certainty  of  punishment, 
just  as  he  is  deterred  in  some  of  the  States,  where  he  has  not  political  power, 
from  petty  and  grand  larceny.  When  traveling  through  sparsely  settled  regions 
in  many  of  the  Southern  States  one  may  generally  leave  his  personal  property 
unprotected  by  lock  or  key.  The  negro  will  not  steal  it.  In  some  of  the  States 
petty  larceny  by  negroes  is  punished  with  undue  severity,  in  imitation  of  the 
barbarous  English  sentences  which  send  a  man  to  jail  for  eighteen  months  for 
taking  a  loaf  of  bread.  Rape  and  similar  crimes,  of  which  in  all  the  States 
negroes  are  occasionally  guilty,  are  invariably  punished  with  death ;  and  the 
rape,  justly  considered  a  capital  offence  by  all  nations,  is  almost  always  avenged 
at  the  hands  of  Judge  Lynch. 

The  negro  is  far  from  being  a  savage,  even  in  his  most  degraded  condition. 
Whiskey,  however,  operates  as  badly  upon  him  as  upon  the  whites ;  it  prompts 
him  to  an  indiscriminate  use  of  the  revolver  and  the  knife,  when,  if  he  were  in  his 
sober  senses,  he  would  be  contented  with  a  solid  bout  at  fisticuffs.  The  negro, 
however,  rarely  cherishes  a  feud  for  many  years,  as  the  low  whites  do.  His 
vengeance  is  prompt,  or  his  careless  nature  leads  him,  if  he  delays,  to  forget  it. 
No  Southern  man,  even  when  surrounded  by  a  hundred  negroes  politically 
hostile  to  him  on  any  remote  plantation,  fears  for  his  life.  A  kind  of  tacit 
confession  of  his  superiority  pervades  his  dusky  dependents,  and  he  might  kill 
half-a-dozen  of  them  without  incurring  any   danger  of    Lynch  law.      In    the 


MORAL      GRADES     AMONG      THE      BLACKS. 


779 


cities  where  the  negroes  flock  together  idly  and  become  more  vicious  than 
in  the  country,  occasional  cutting  and  shooting  among  themselves  are  not 
uncommon ;  and  now  and  then  when  a  white  man  kills  one  of  their  number,  they 
resent  the  slaughter  by  riot,  but  they  rarely  bring  the  offender  to  justice.  It 
would,  I  think,  be  perfectly  fair  to  say  that  not  half-a-dozen  white  men  have 
been  hung  in  the  South  since  the  war,  for  the  murder  of  negroes.  I  believe 
conviction  for  such  a  crime  would  be  quite  impossible  in  the  present  state  of 
opinion  in  some  Southern  States. 

That    there    is    a    large    class    of  negroes    who    are    intrinsically    mean  and 
gravitating  steadily  downward  toward  the  worst  phases  of  rascality,  there  is  no 


Southern  Types  —  A  Little  Unpleasantness. 

doubt.  About  one-third  of  the  negroes  in  the  South  is  in  a  very  hopeful 
condition ;  another  third  seems  to  be  in  a  comparatively  stationary  attitude  ; 
another  third  is  absolutely  good  for  nothing,  prefers  theft  to  honest  labor,  and 
makes  no  steady  progress  in  morality,  refinement,  or  education  of  any  kind. 
The  religion  of  the  negroes  in  many  parts  of  the  South  appears  pretty 
completely  divorced  from  morality. 

It  is  difficult  to  persuade  one's  self  that  the  blacks  as  yet  deserve  recognition 

as  a  moral  race.     Their  best  friends  will  admit  that,  though  very  religious,  they 

are  also  very  immoral.     Adultery,  which  is  a  mortal  sin  among  the  Northern 

and  Southern  white  religionists,  is  simply  venial  to  the  black  man.     His  conver- 

50 


780 


THE     NEGRO  S      CONSCIENCE. 


sion  to  the  religion  of  the  Lord  does  not  seem  to  build  up  the  negro's  conscience. 
The  tough  moral  fibre  of  the  Anglo-Saxon,  which  came  only  by  slow  growth,  is 
not  perceptible  in  the  negro ;  neither  could  it  be  expected,  considering  that  he 
was  brought  from  the  jungles  of  Africa  into  a  comparatively  wild  region  in 
America,  and  that,  under  the  dominion  of  slavery,  his  moral  growth  was  but 
lazily  helped.  That  the  negro  has  made  progress  no  one  will  be  inclined  to 
dispute,  but  he  started  from  such  a  low  and  bestial  condition  that  he  has  as  yet 
reached  only  the  confines  of  real  Christianity.  He  tries  to  be  a  good  Christian, 
and  yet  is  not  always  satisfied  with  one  wife.  He  is  not  restrained  by  the 
fear  of  what  people  will  say  of  him,  as  the  whites  universally  are.     The  moral 


Southern  Types  —  "  Going  to  Church. ' ' 

tone  of  all  his  fellows  is  so  low,  the  temptations  to  occasional  lapses  from  virtue 
on  the  part  of  his  spiritual  advisers  of  his  own  color  are  often  so  great,  that  it  is 
not  astonishing  that  his  backslidings  are  frequent.  His  idea  is  that  salvation  is 
attained  by  shouting.  The  Anglo-Saxon  believes  that  salvation  can  only  be 
attained  by  self-denial,  faith,  and  hard  work.  In  some  parts  of  the  South  the 
negro,  while  under  conviction,  goes  into  spasms,  and  is  unfit  for  his  daily  duties. 
If  he  is  a  cook  he  spoils  the  dinner,  and  if  he  is  a  field-hand  his  master  finds 
occasion  to  complain  of  him.  In  Virginia,  and  doubtless  in  many  other  States, 
the  negro   alludes    to    this    spiritual    condition    as    being    "  in    the    wilderness." 


RELIGIOUS     EXERCISES. 


78l 


He  has  found  no  peace,  he  cannot  profess  to  be  converted  until  he  sees  a  great 
light,  hears  a  voice  from  Heaven,  and  has  a  visitation  from  an  angel  of  God. 
Then  his  spirit  is  filled  at  once  with  brightness  and  light,  and  in  the  public 
revival-meetings  he  often  jumps  six  feet  into  the  air,  embraces  with  effusion 
all  the  deacons  and  ministers,  and  in  some  of  the  States  he  is  not  considered 
as  converted  unless  he  can  say  this  formula : 

"  The  Lord  has  taken  my  feet  out  of  the  miry  clay  and  set  them  on  the  rock  of  ages,  where 
the  very  gates  of  hell  shall  not  prevail  against  them." 

If  the  brother  or  sister  under  conviction  cannot  say  this  phrase  exactly,  the 
preachers  and  deacons  will  tell  them  that  they  are  not  yet  out  of  the  wilderness, 
and  will  refuse  to  admit  them  to  religious  communion. 

All  the  negro  meetings  which  I  attended  were  marked  by  intense 
convulsions  of  the  muscles  on  the  part  of  all  the  people  present.  Even  the 
best  educated  colored  ministers  seemed  to  rely  upon  theatrical  contortions 
of  face,  and  mighty  stampings  of  feet  and  waving  of  arms,  for  effect  on  the 
congregations.  Listening  outside  the  open  windows  of  a  negro  church  in 
Florida  one  evening,  I  heard  the 
preacher  furiously  pounding  the  Bible 
which  lay  on  the  sacred  clesk.  His 
words  were  incoherent,  his  logic  was 
sadly  at  fault ;  some  of  his  appeals 
seemed  ludicrous,  but  every  thump  on 
the  holy  volume  brought  a  tempest  of 
shoutings,  sighs,  and  moans  from  the 
dusky  hearers.  On  the  plantations  the 
camp-meetings  and  revivals  sometimes 
totally  unfit  the  negroes  for  labor  dur- 
ing the  whole  week.  Men  and  women 
foam  at  the  mouth,  wander  about  the 
fields  and  forests  half  distracted,  a 
spasm  of  spiritual  insanity  having 
taken  possession  of  them.  In  such 
moments  of  rare  enthusiasm  they 
sometimes  descend  to  orgies  ;  whiskey 
and  licentiousness  do  their  work,  and 
the  whole  meeting  will  be  transformed 
into  an  assembly  of  blackamoor 
maenads  and  satyrs.  A  clever  Nor- 
therner, who  has  for  many  years 
dwelt  in  the  South,  once  told  me  that 
he  considered  the  Christianity  of  the  negro  as  Fetichism  with  a  Christian  cloak  on. 

This  may  seem  a  hard  and  unfriendly  judgment  of  negro  character,  but  the 
careful  observer  who  studies  the  characteristics  of  the  whole  black  population 
will  yet  not  fail  to  see  signs  of  encouragement.      He  will  discover  that  a  mighty 


Southern  Types — A  Negro  Constable. 


782  AN      AMUSING      EXAMPLE. 

uplifting  has  really  been  going  on  since  1865,  and  that  an  influx  of  good  teachers, 
who  shall  teach  industry,  thrift,  continence,  and  self-respect,  will  in  another 
decade  raise  the  four  and  a-half  million  negroes  in  the  South  to  pretty  near  the 
level  of  Christian  manhood  and  womanhood.  Such  discouraging  views  of  the 
negroes  in  the  Gulf  States  as  are  taken  by  many  of  the  native  whites,  are  the 
result  of  a  mistaken  judgment.  Even  Caucasian  ministers  of  the  gospel,  whose 
hearts  are  supposed  to  be  filled  with  charity  for  and  faith  in  all  men,  refuse  to  see 
any  tendency  on  the  part  of  poor  Sambo  to  improve  his  advantages.  They  do 
not  seem  to  understand  that  moral  growth  is  slow,  and  that  so  long  as  the  negro 
remains  in  ignorance,  and,  in  a  measure,  uncertain  as  to  his  future  condition,  he 
will  not  develop  very  rapidly. 

Traveling  one  day  from  Jackson  to  Grenada  in  Mississippi,  I  observed  a 
bright,  intelligent- looking  negro  woman  seated  near  me  in  the  smoking-car  which 
I  had  entered  for  a  moment.  By  her  side  was  her  little  girl,  three  or  four  years 
of  age.  At  one  of  the  wayside  stations  a  smart  mulatto  man  entered  the  car, 
and,  being  acquainted  with  the  young  woman,  speedily  addressed  her  thus : 

"Why,  Sister  Smith,  how  is  you  ?" 

"Why,  Brudder  Brown,  tol'able,  thank  you;  how  is  yourself?" 

"  I 's  tol'able;  always  tol'able,  thank  you." 

"  Is  you  quite  sho'  you  is  tol'able  ?" 

"Oh,  yas;  I 's  tol'able,  very  tol'able,  thank  you." 

"  Whar  is  you  gwine,  Brudder  Brown  ?" 

"  Oh,  I  's  gwine  up  hyar  to  'tend  a  meeting ;  is  dat  your  little  gal,  Sister 
Smith?" 

"Yas,  dat 's  my  little  gal." 

"  How  is  your  little  gal,  Sister  Smith  ?" 
•  "  Oh,  she  is  tol'able,  thank  you,  very  tol'able ;  is  your  children  tol'able  ?" 

"Yas,  yas  thank  you." 

"  Is  you  married,  Sister  Smith  ?" 

"  No,  Lor  !  I  is  n't  married  ;  what  would  I  be  married  for  ?" 

"Whar  did  you  get  dat  little  gal,  Sister  Smith  ?" 

"  Dat 's  one  I  done  foun',  Brudder  Brown  ; "  whereupon  the  two  indulged  in  a 
sympathetic  giggle. 

But  the  teachers  of  the  various  Freedmen's  Aid  and  ^Missionary  Associations, 
as  well  as  Southern  people  of  high  character,  such  as  the  daughters  of  Christian 
ex- Confederate  soldiers,  who  do  not  count  it  a  shame  to  teach  the  ignorant 
negro,  are  gradually  shaping  opinion  favorable  to  marriage  among  the  blacks ; 
and  while  great  numbers  of  ex-slaves  still  prefer  the  old  fashion  of  living  together 
so  long  as  they  can  agree,  without  having  any  sacred  compact  between  them, 
they  feel  that  they  still  have  a  duty  toward  their  offspring,  and  illegitimate  birth 
is  slowly  becoming  among  the  blacks,  as  among  the  whites,  a  cause  for  reproach. 

In  many  of  the  States  until  very  recently,  the  railroad  stations  had  rooms 
over  the  doors  of  which  were  signs  marked,  "For  colored  people  only."  But 
this  odious  distinction  against  race  is,  I  believe,  gradually  dying  out.  I  do  not 
remember  to  have  noticed  it  often.     In  some  sections  of  Georgia  it  may  perhaps 


THE      BLACKS      DO      NOT     OCCUPY      FIRST-CLASS      CARS.  783 

still  be  seen,  but  I  would  not  affirm  that  it  is  general  even  in  that  State. 
Negroes  and  whites,  however,  do  not  ride  together  in  the  same  railway  cars, 
in  those  States  where  the  blacks  are  absolutely  masters  of  the  political  situa- 
tion, nor  do  I  believe  that  the  whites  would  tolerate  the  admission  of  the  black 
race  to  an  equal  share  in  the  first-class  accommodations  of  travel.  The  blacks 
usually  buy  second-class  tickets,  and  as  tne  Southern  railroads  are  very  poof  in 
rolling  stock,  black  men  and  black  women  are  crowded  together  into  smoking- 
cars  of  trains  where  the  white  men  who  enter  to  smoke,  pay  as  little  attention  to 
the  etiquette  of  travel  as  if  no  members  of  the  female  sex  were  present.  There 
is  an  occasional  outburst  on  the  part  of  the  whites  when  an  aggressive  negro 
attempts  to  assert  his  right  to  a  berth  in  a  sleeping-car  or  to  enter  a  first-class 
carriage. 

In  South-western  Virginia  I  once  entered  the  smoking-car  of  a  through 
train,  and  was  suddenly  accosted  in  a  fierce  manner  by  an  intelligent  looking 
mulatto  who  inquired  if  I  was  born  in  the  South,  and  if  I  ever  owned  slaves. 
Responding  in  the  negative,  he  began  a  violent  harangue  against  the  railroad 
authorities,  saying  that  it  made  his  blood  boil  to  be  refused  a  first-class  ticket; 
that  he  was  from  Tennessee,  and  as  good  as  any  white  man,  and  added  very 
bitterly  that  he  was  "damned  if  he  appreciated  it."  He  was  well  dressed, 
cleanly,  and  appeared  decently  educated.  In  a  New  York  horse-car,  room  would 
have  been  made  for  him  even  on  a  crowded  seat,  but  the  Southern  people  dis'ike 
to  establish  a  precedent  for  the  admission  of  the  colored  race  to  the  same  facili- 
ties of  travel  enjoyed  by  the  whites. 

In  Louisiana  and  South  Carolina  the  negroes  do  from  time  to  time  monopo- 
lize the  trains,  and  create  disturbance  when  their  presence  is  objected  to  ;  but  if 
they  insisted  upon  it  as  a  general  thing  the  whites  would  arm  themselves  and 
speedily  check  any  such  aggression.  The  negroes  as  a  mass  have  not,  however, 
even  where  their  civil  rights  are  practically  gained,  been  difficult  to  manage  in 
this  delicate  matter.  They  avoid  a  collision  with  white  prejudices  as  much  as 
possible  ;  as  great  numbers  of  them  are  ragged  and  engaged  in  menial  occupa- 
tions, their  presence  in  a  car  where  elegantly-dressed  ladies  and  gentlemen  are 
seated  would  certainly  be  far  from  agreeable,  and  they  recognize  this  fact  quite 
as  readily  as  they  could  be  expected  to  do.  Until  they  have  gained  much 
more  property  than  they  at  present  possess  as  a  class,  they  will  not  be  likely  to 
secure  the  recognition  of  their  equality,  which  they  certainly  desire,  however 
little  they  may  assert  it. 


LXXXVIII. 

DIALECT  —  FORMS    OF   EXPRESSION — DIET. 

THE  noticeable  differences  in  dialect  and  mode  of  expression  between  the 
North  and  South  have  been  noted,  caricatured,  and  exemplified  hundreds 
of  times.  The  lower  class  of  Southern  whites  have  undoubtedly  caught  some 
methods  of  speech,  and  certain  fatal  defects  of  pronunciation,  from  the  negro. 


Southern  Types  —  The  Wolf  and  the  Lamb  in  Politics. 

Sometimes,  as  we  have  seen  in  South  Carolina,  the  rude  and  coarse  dialect  of  the 
plantation  hand,  who  never  in  his  long  life  had  an  instant's  education,  is  reflected 
in  the  speech  of  the  haughty  and  high-bred  gentleman's  son.  But  this  will  no 
longer  be  so.  The  intimate  communion  which  was  possible  in  the  days  of 
slavery  between  the  white  and  the  black  is  now,  for  a  dozen  obvious  reasons, 
impossible.  The  intermixture  of  dialects  is  as  sure  to  be  stopped  as  the  com- 
mingling of  bloods.      Competent  observers  say  that  miscegenation  was   nearly 


SEPARATION      BETWEEN      THE      RACES.  785 

ended  by  the  war  and  the  emancipation  of  the  slave;  that  the  social  equality 
which  certain  of  the  whites  in  the  South  now  seem  to  fear  has  been  rendered 
impossible  by  the  very  event  which  established  the  independence  of  the  negro. 
The  two  races  are  steadily  drifting  apart,  so  far  as  all  intimate  association  is 
concerned. 

No  one  can  doubt  that  the  negro  who  was  born  a  slave  still  retains  the  pro- 
foundest  respect  for,  and  in  general  also  a  kind  of  admiration  with  regard  to,  his 
late  master;  but,  except  on  remote  plantations  where,  thus  far,  but  small  change  in 
the  habits  and  customs  of  the  natives  has  resulted  from  the  war,  the  white  and 
black  children  do  not  associate  in  the  friendly  comity  of  old ;  a  kind  of  barrier 
seems  to  have  been  erected  between  them,  and  it  is  but  right  it  should  be  so. 
There  seems  no  reason  for  believing  that  the  negro  cherishes  any  insane  desire 
to  promote  miscegenation.  There  is  a  tendency  in  some  sections  of  the  South 
among  the  full-blacks  to  marry,  as  the  whites  phrase  it,  "above  their  color,"  or, 
as  the  negro  himself  would  express  it,  "into  America,  and  not  back  into  Africa." 
A  jet  black  man  often  shows  a  marked  preference  for  a  mulatto  woman,  and  a 
full-black  girl  will  not  hesitate  long  in  expressing  her  preference  for  a  smart 
yellow  boy  of  the  modified  and  subdued  African  type  over  the  thick-lipped, 
long-heeled  negro  who  may  also  be  enamored  of  her  charms.  A  pupil  in  one 
of  the  Virginia  schools  for  the  colored  people  told  a  teacher  that  of  her  two 
suitors  she  liked  the  character  of  the  one  who  was  jet  black  the  best,  but  that, 
altogether,  she  preferred  the  mulatto  who  also  wooed  her,  because  of  his  color 
and  his  refinement.  But  the  full-blacks  are  gradually  beginning  to  assert  them- 
selves, and  certainly  in  South  Carolina,  and  in  many  other  sections,  they  have  as 
much  pride  of  race  as  has  the  haughty  Caucasian. 

Just  how  much  influence  the  incapacity  of  the  negro  to  pronounce  many 
of  our  English  words  has  had  upon  the  speech  of  the  Southern  people  it 
would  be  difficult  to  say.  It  is  not  probable  that  the  masses  in  the  lower 
class  at  the  South  would  feel  flattered  if  told  that  their  speech  much  re- 
sembles that  of  the  Africans.  It  may  be  said  without  exaggeration  that  all 
classes  of  Southerners  find  it  impossible  to  pronounce  the  letter  "r."  They 
seem  to  have  the  same  difficulty  that  the  Parisian  has  in  giving  it  its  full 
roundness  and  completeness.  Such  words  as  "door"  and  "floor,"  and  "before," 
are  transformed  into  "do'"  "no'"  and  "befo'"  by  the  lower  class,  while  some 
educated  and  refined  people  pronounce  them  "  doah,"  "  floah,"  and  almost 
invariably  allude  to  our  late  unpleasantness  as  the  "waw."  The  use  of "  I 
reckon,"  for  "I  guess,"  or  "  I  think,"  is,  of  course,  universal.  Now  and  then  the 
Southerner  says  "I  Calculate,"  or  "I  allow,"  but  rarely  "I  guess,"  or  "I  think," 
unless  in  delicate  deference  to  his  Northern  visitor. 

The  highly  educated  people  of  the  South  speak  an  elegant  and  chaste 
English,  in  which,  by  the  way,  they  take  an  especial  pride.  The  planter,  the 
city  merchant,  the  factor,  the  professional  man  of  eminence,  the  lawyers  and 
physicians,  the  doctors,  and  even  the  country  squires,  judges,  and  militia 
colonels,  all  are  distinguished  for  an  exactness  and  nicety  in  the  use  of  lan- 
guage which  is   very  agreeable.      There  is   a   refinement  and    courtesy  in    the 


786  UNAMIABLE     TYPES ODDITIES      OF      EXPRESSION. 

manners  of  the  country  gentlemen,  and  an  absence  of  anything  like  a  relapse 
into  the  slang  of  the  day,  or  familiar  forms  of  expression,  which  are  perhaps 
more  noticeable  in   the  North  and  West  than  in  the  South. 

The  joking  and  chaffing  so  common  among  acquaintances,  and  even  strangers, 
in  many  parts  of  the  North,  is  not  understood  at  the  South,  and  a  Southerner 
will  often  fancy  his  dignity  seriously  offended  by  some  sally  which  would  pass 
unnoticed  among  other  people.  There  is  also  an  occasional  undue  assumption 
of  dignity  on  the  part  of  employes  in   public  offices. 

On  one  occasion,  remonstrating  with  a  clerk  in  the  office  of  a  Texas  stage 
company  because  he  demanded  the  moderate  sum  of  four  dollars  and  a-half  in 
gold  for  transporting  my  trunk  eighty  miles,  he  flew  into  a  towering  passion  and 
inquired  if  "I  meant  to  tell  him  that  he  lied."  Nothing  would  have  been  easier 
than  to  quarrel  with  him,  yet  a  moment  afterward  he  was  convinced  that  my 
inquiry  was  justifiable. 

A  Northern  gentleman,  venturing  to  question  the  price  of  a  telegram  in  the 
office  of  the  telegraph  company  it^a  Mississippi  town,  was  haughtily  reminded 
by  the  chief  clerk  that  he  did  n't  allow  his  statements  to  be  questioned.  This 
excess  of  individualism,  however,  is  perhaps  a  mark  of  provincial  manners  quite 
as  much  as  of  Southern  breeding,  and  does  not  in  any  sense  apply  to  the 
educated  and  refined  Southerner. 

To  note  the  characteristics  of  the  South  properly,  one  would  be  compelled 
to  classify  them  by  States,  as  the  citizen  of  Maryland  would  be  loth  to  admit 
the  justness  of  a  judgment  which  would  be  reasonable  with  regard  to  Texas,  and 
the  Virginian  would  repel  with  indignation  the  assumption  that  he  has  a  few 
traits  which  might  very  properly  be  ascribed  to  the  people  of  Louisiana. 

Recurring  to  the  matter  of  speech  and  its  peculiarities  in  the  Southern  States, 
it  may  be  said  that  it  is  among  the  poor  whites  that  eccentricities  are  mainly 
found. 

The  Union  soldiers  brought  home  with  them  an  inexhaustible  fund  of  stories 
illustrating  the  dialect  of  these  people,  and  relate  with  gusto  the  anecdote  of  the 
venerable  Georgia  cracker  dame,  who,  when  a  company  of  Kentucky  Confeder- 
ate cavalry  passed  her  house,  inquired  : 

"Be  you-uns  kim  all  the  way  from  Kintuck,  critter  back,  to  fight  for 
we-uns?" 

The  use  of  "we-uns"  and  "you-uns"  is  very  noticeable  in  North  Carolina  and 
Eastern  Tennessee,  both  in  the  mountains  and  valleys.  The  same  thickness  of 
pronunciation  in  certain  words  which  is  remarkable  in  the  West,  but  never  in  the 
East,  as  in  the  words  "there"  and  "where,"  and  "here,"  which  become,  "thar," 
"whar"  and  "hyar,"  are  observable  among  the  lower  classes  in  the  South. 

There  are  also  certain  shibboleths  by  which  the  traveler  from  south  of  Mason 
and  Dixon's  line  is  always  marked  in  the  North  and  in  Europe.  These  are  the 
before-mentioned  inability  to  give  the  letter  "r"  its  due,  and  the  transformation 
of  such  words  as  "car"  into  "  cyah." 

Some  waggish  Northern  critic  has  asserted  that  the  mass  of  ex-slave-holders 
find  great  difficulty  in  pronouncing  the  word  "negro,"  from  their  long  habit  of 


VAGUE      IDEAS      OF      DISTANCE. 


/S/ 


alluding  to  the  black  man  only  as  a  "  nigger,"  and  that  they  now-a-days  call 
him  a  "niggro."  But  I  suspect  that  there  is  a  spice  of  malice  in  this  hyper- 
critical statement. 

The  use  of  "I  don't  reckon"  sometimes  strikes  one  unpleasantly,  coming,  as 
it  often  does,  at  the  end  of  a  sentence.  "Right  smart"  is  used  in  a  variety  of 
ways  never  employed  at  the  North.  The  Southerner  says,  "We  shall  have  a 
right  smart  crop  this  season,"  or,  "There  was  a  right  smart  of  people  at  the  last 
meeting,"  or,  "I  shall  have  a  right  smart  chance  of  business."  "Right"  is  used 
pretty  generally  throughout  the  South  in  the  sense  in  which  Northerners  use 
"  very."  Of  a  lady  they  say  that  she  is  right  pretty,  of  a  fruit  that  it  is  right 
good,  of  scenery  that  it  is  right  magnificent. 


Southern  Types  —  Two  Veterans  Discussing  the  Political  Situation. 

With  regard  to  distance,  there  seems  in  the  back-country  a  charming  disre- 
gard of  actual  measurement.  The  negro  is  especially  vague  in  his  statements  as 
to  the  number  of  miles  between  any  two  towns.  He  will  either  tell  you  that  it  is 
a  "right  smart  distance,"  or  may  state  that  it  is  "two  good  looks  and  a  dog 
bark,"  or  that  it  is  "a  hop,  skip,  and  a  go-so."  This  would  hardly  be  credited 
unless  one  heard  it.  The  negro  was,  up  to  the  date  of  the  war,  intensely  local 
in  feeling.  The  boundary  of  his  little  neighborhood  was  to  him  the  horizon 
where  the  world  stopped,  and,  traveling  but  little,  he  got  but  slight  idea  of 
distances.      In  some  portions  of  the  Southern  mountains  we  found  the  whites  were 


788  A     CURIOUS     FORM      OF     ASSENT. 

very  familiar  with,  distances  in  their  own  State  and  counties,  but  not  outside  .of 
those  limits.  The  chief  difficulty  in  obtaining  accurate  information  from  the 
negroes  seemed  to  be  their  disinclination  to  assertion.  A  visitor  to  the  Virginia 
springs  noted  as  curious  that  the  negroes  there  would  not,  as  a  rule,  dissent 
from  remarks  by  white  people.  If  asked,  "  Does  this  stream  run  up  hill?"  the 
negro  would  be  apt  to  say  :  "  Yas,  sah,  reckon  it  do,  sah;"  but  if  the  question 
were  put  in  a  leading  form,  as:  "This  stream  runs  down  hill,  of  course,  does  it 
not?"  he  would  say:   "Sartinly,  sah." 

The  use  of  the  word  "stranger,"  as  applied  to  an  individual  whose  name  one 
is  not  familiar  with,  so  common  in  the  extreme  West,  we  found  to  prevail  among 
the  mountain  populations  of  the  South,  but  so  far  as  my  observation  went,  no- 
where else.  Sometimes  the  natives  whom  we  encountered  would  say,  "  Mistah," 
and  pause,  as  if  expecting  you  to  supply  your  name.  If  you  did  not  do  so  they 
would  inquire,  "What  did  you  say  your  name  was,"  or  more  frequently,  "What 
mout  your  name  be?"  A  curious  form  of  assent,  which  must  be  heard  to  be 
appreciated,  and  which  Dickens  caricatured  mercilessly  when  he  first  visited  this 
country,  prevails  in  the  mountains  of  Eastern  Tennessee  and  Western  North 
Carolina.     The  following  will  serve  as  an  example: 

While  discussing  the  outer  world  with  old  Parson  Caton,  in  a  remote  mount- 
ain district  of  Tennessee,  he  inquired  if  New  York  was  not  a  right  smart  place, 
and  being  assured  that  it  was,  he  said  with  a  rising  inflection,  "  Yes,  sir  ? " 
Whereupon  I  responded,  "  Yes,  sir."  "As  likely  a  place  as  Louisville,  I 
reckon,"  he  added ;  to  which  I  answered,  "  Yes,  sir,"  he  chiming  in  interroga- 
tively, "Yes,  sir?" 

These  mountain  peculiarities  of  speech  demand  more  study  than  we  were 
able  to  give  them.  They  strike  the  visitor  at  first  very  strangely,  but  he 
gradually  becomes  accustomed  to  them.  They  differ  considerably  from  the 
barbarous  nasal  Yankee  slang  spoken  in  certain  sections  of  New  England,  but 
they  have,  nevertheless,  many  points  of  resemblance  to  it.  There  is  nowhere 
in  the  South  any  such  conspicuous  difference  from  Northern  habits  of  speech 
as  is  found  between  the  dialects  of  the  French  peasants  living  in  two  towns  near 
each  other.  Some  of  the  mountaineers  speak  of  "hit,"  instead  of  "it,"  and 
emphasize  the  word  as  in  this  case:  "I  meant  to  have  brought  my  gun,  but 
I  forgot  hit." 

Words  of  endearment  between  husband  and  wife  in  the  South  often  show 
an  unconscious  borrowing  from  the  negroes.  Where  the  Northern  husband 
habitually  calls  his  wife  "dear"  or  "darling,"  the  Southern  man  says  "honey," 
alike  to  his  spouse  and  to  his  offspring. 

The  negro  in  South  Carolina,  and  in  other  adjacent  States,  shows  a  tendency 
to  render  the  English  language  more  musical  than  it  is  when  spoken  by  Anglo- 
Saxons.  He  gives  an  extra  syllable  to  words  which  end  abruptly,  and  puts  a 
kind  of  rhythm  into  all  that  he  says.  The  Virginia  negro,  especially  when  he 
shows  the  influence  of  mixed  blood,  copies  the  speech  of  the  whites  as  nearly  as 
possible,  making  some  ludicrous  errors  when  he  attempts  to  catch  the  sonorous 
refrain  of  long  words.      He  still  speaks  of  people  who   impress  him   favorably  as 


NEGRO     WIT.  789 

"  quality  folk,"  and  now  and  then,  when  disdainfully  describing  some  unimpressive 
people,  will  denominate  them  "white  trash,"  or  even  admit  that  they  are  "  worse 
than  niggers."  Entering  Barnum's  Hotel,  in  Baltimore,  one  evening,  I  found  the 
colored  bell-boys  gathered  round  an  old  negro  servant,  who  was  reading  from 
the  evening  paper  some  instance  of  unparalleled  meanness  which  a  white  man 
had  been  guilty  of.  After  he  had  finished  the  anecdote  he  said:  "Boys,  dat 's — 
dat  's  real  niggerism,"  thus  expressing  his  contempt  for  the  conduct  of  the  white 
man  in  question. 

In  Natchez,  on  the  Mississippi,  I  noticed  that  some  of  the  white  children, 
even  those  who  attended  private  schools  and  were  evidently  kept  from  street 
communion  with  the  negroes  as  much  as  possible,  copied  the  defects  of  the 
colored  man's  speech.  Our  landlord's  son,  for  instance,  pointing  to  our  carriage 
which  had  arrived  at  the  door,  said:  "Da  he,"  which  was  plantation  slang  for 
"There  it  is."  Since  the  negroes  gained  their  freedom,  those  among  them  who 
had  been  servants  of  wealthy  gentlemen,  and  who  had  consequently  been 
thrown  into  the  company  of  white  people,  speak  very  good  English,  except 
when  they  endeavor  to  use  long  words,  when  they  sometimes  mix  their  meanings. 

In  San  Antonio  I  saw  an  officer  of  the  garrison  handing  some  invitations 
for  a  reception  to  the  old  darkey  who  was  to  distribute  them  through  the  town. 

"Now,  Uncle,"  he  said,  "mind  you  do  this  promptly."  "Yes,  sah, "  said 
the  old  man,  "I  will  regenerate  dem, "  meaning  that  he  would  distribute 
them. 

Here  and  there  the  polite  black  servants  in  the  first  class  hotels  hinted  that 
"  renumeration, "  instead  of  "  remuneration,"  would  be  agreeable.  The  negro  is 
almost  as  quick  of  wit  of  a  certain  kind  as  the  Irish  peasant.  He  is  disposed,  as 
European  servants  are,  to  presume  upon  the  good-natured  familiarity  of  his 
superiors  in  position,  and  serves  one  best  when  a  dignified  and  distant  demeanor 
is  maintained  toward  him. 

At  Lynchburg  we  noticed  that  "  Charles,"  one  of  the  colored  waiters,  black 
as  the  traditional  ace  of  spades,  and  very  clumsy  withal,  made  extravagant 
professions  of  his  willingness  to  serve  us,  but  managed  to  make  his  fellow- servant, 
"Harry,"  do  all  the  work.  I  therefore  ventured  a  remark  something  in  this 
wise  : 

"  It  appears  to  me,  Charles,  that  Harry  does  all  the  waiting  and  you  do  all 
the  talking." 

"  Yas,  sah, "  he  answered,  civilly  but  quickly,  "  I  does  de  talkin',  and  de 
smokin'  too,  when  de  gemmen  gives  me  cigars." 

After  that  we  considered  Charles  incorrigible. 

The  negro  valet,  taught  by  years  of  experience  under  the  slave  system,  is 
probably  the  best  in  the  world.  He  is  always  civil,  attentive,  deferential,  and 
adheres  to  his  master's  fortunes,  good  or  ill,  with  remarkable  tenacity.  It  is  not 
from  him  that  you  will  hear  complaints  of  his  old  position.  Indeed  he  looks 
backward  half  regretfully  to  the  days  of  the  slave-holders'  domination,  and 
often  gazes  with  proud  scorn  upon  the  struggling  blacks  who  are  playing 
fantastic  tricks  in  the  political  world. 


790  ON   THE  PORT  ROYAL  ISLANDS. 

The  teachers  on  the  Port  Royal  islands,  in  South  Carolina,  in  the  book 
called  "  Slave  Songs  of  the  United  States,"  give  many  interesting  instances  of 
what  is  probably  the  most  remarkable  negro  dialect  in  the  South.  They  say 
that,  "With  these  people  the  process  of  'phonetic  decay'  appears  to  have  gone  as 
far,  perhaps,  as  is  possible,  and  with  it  an  extreme  simplification  of  etymology 
and  syntax.  There  is,  of  course,  the  usual  softening  of  th  and  v,  or  f,  into  d 
and  b  ;  likewise  a  frequent  interchange  of  v  and  w,  as  veeds  and  veil,  for  weeds 
and  well ;  woices  and  pumkin  wine,  for  voices  and  pumpkin  vine.  '  De  wile' 
(vilest)  sinner  may  return.'  This  last  example  illustrates  also  their  constant 
habit  of  clipping  words  and  syllables,  as  lee'  bro ',  for  little  brother ;  plant' shim, 
for  plantation.  The  lengthening  of  short  vowels  is  illustrated  in  both  these  {a, 
for  instance,  rarely  has  its  short  English  sound)  '  Een  (in)  dat  mornin'  all  day.' 

"  Strange  words  are  less  numerous  in  their  patois  than  one  would  suppose, 
and,  few  as  they  are,  many  of  them  may  be  readily  derived  from  English  words. 
Besides  the  familiar  buckra,  and  a  few  proper  names,  as  Cuffy,  Quash,  and 
perhaps  Cudjo,  I  only  know  of  churray  (spill)  which  may  be  '  throw'  way ; ' 
ouna  or  ona,  'you'  (both  singular  and  plural,  and  used  only  for  friends),  as 
'  Ona  build  a  house  in  Paradise  ;'  and  aw,  a  kind  of  expletive,  equivalent  to  '  to 
be  sure,'  as,  'Dat  clot'  cheap.'  'Cheap  aw.'  'Dat  Monday  one  lazy  boy.' 
'  Lazy  aw — I  'bleege  to  lick  'em. '  " 

These  interesting  quotations  illustrate  the  linguistic  peculiarities  of  the  South 
Carolina  negro.  It  is  supposed  that  the  fashion  which  the  negroes  in  all  parts 
of  the  South  have  of  speaking  of  their  elders  as  uncles  and  aunts,  or  as  daddy 
and  mammy,  arose  originally  from  a  feeling  of  respect,  and  as  they  were  not 
allowed  to  call  each  other  Mr.  or  Mrs.  they  adopted  this. 

Almost  universally  on  the  sea-islands  they  call  their  equals  also  cousin. 
Their  speech  has  but  little  inflection  or  power  of  expressing  grammatical  relation 
in  any  way.  Even  to-day  they  make  little  distinction  of  tense,  gender,  case, 
number,  or  person.  "  He  "  is  most  common  as  a  possessive  pronoun.  Thus  the 
teachers  say  that  "him"  might  mean  a  girl  as  well  as  a  boy.  I  quote  the 
following  specimens  of  negro  talk  from  the  volume  published  by  the  teachers 
mentioned  above,  as  it  gives,  better  than  any  one  else  has  been  able  to  show, 
the  peculiarities  of  this  remarkable  dialect. 

"  A  scene  at  the  opening  of  a  school : 

"  'Charles,  why  did  n't  you  come  to  school  earlier?'  'A-could  n't  come  soon 
to-day,  sir;  de  boss  he  sheer  out  clo'  dis  mornin'.'  'What  did  he  say  to 
you?'  'Me,  sir?  I  ain't  git;  de  boss  he  de  baddest  buckra  ebber  a-see. 
De  morest  part  ob  de  mens  dey  git  heaps  o'  clo' — more  'n  nuff;  'n  I  ain't 
git  nuffin.'  'Were  any  other  children  there?'  'Plenty  chil'n,  sir.  All  de 
chil'n  dah  fo'  sun-up.'  'January,  you  haven't  brought  your  book.'  'It  is, 
sir;  sh'um  here,  sir?'  'Where  is  Jim?'  'I  ain't  know  where  he  gone,  sir.' 
'Where  is  Sam?'  'He  didn't  been  here.'  'Where  is  the  little  boy,  John?' 
'He  pick  up  he  foot  and  run.'  A  new  scholar  is  brought:  'Good  mornin', 
maussa ;  I  bring  dis  same  chile  to  school,  sir ;  do  don't  let  'em  stay  arter 
school  done.    Here  you,  gal;  stan'  up  an'  say  howdy  to  de  genlm'n.     De  maussa 


SOUTHERN      COOKERY.  791 

lash  'em  well  ef  he  don't  larn  de  lesson.'  'Where  's  your  book,  Tom?' 
'Dunno,  sir.  Somebody  mus'  a  tief  'em.'  'Where's  your  brother?'  'Sh'im 
dar  ?  wid  bof  he  han'  in  he  pocket  ?'  'Billy,  have  you  done  your  sum  ?'  '  Yes, 
sir,  I  out  'em.'  'Where's  Polly?'  'Polly  de-de.'  Taffy  comes  up.  'Please, 
sir,  make  me  sensible  of  dat  word — I  want  to  ketch  'em  werry  bad,  sir,  werry 
bad.'" 

Probably,  no  Northern  traveler  ever  went  South  without  returning  to  com- 
plain with  great  bitterness  of  the  poor  food  which  he  finds  even  in  prosperous 
regions.  Horace  Greeley  told  the  people  of  Texas  that  their  prime  need  was  a 
thousand  good  cooks ;  and,  doubtless,  a  few  regiments  of  Frenchmen,  well 
dispersed  throughout  the  South,  would  succeed  in  giving  the  Southern  people 
some  much  needed  instruction  in  this  respect.  Yet  criticism  of  the  Southern 
cuisine  cannot  be  general.  Nowhere  in  the  world  is  there  better  cookery  or  a 
richer  bill  of  fare  than  that  offered  in  Baltimore,  in  Charleston,  in  Savannah,  and 
in  New  Orleans ;  yet  within  a  few  miles  of  any  of  those  cities  one  comes  into  a 
region  where  coarse  bread,  coarser  pork,  and  a  few  stunted  vegetables  are  the 
only  articles  of  diet  upon  the  farmers'  tables.  In  regions  where  the  best  of 
mutton  and  beef  can  be  raised  at  trivial  expense,  where  with  slight  cultivation  the 
land  will  produce  a  profusion  of  vegetables,  and  where  good  wines  can  be 
raised  from  vines  of  two  or  three  years'  growth,  the  farmers  are  a  lean, 
ill-fed  race.  Nowhere  was  this  more  apparent  to  us  than  in  the  mountains, 
where,  save  at  the  hotels  and  in  the  comfortable  mansions  of  well-to-do  agricul- 
turists, we  were  usually  invited  to  partake  of  hot  and  indigestible  corn  bread,  fried 
and  greasy  ham,  or  bacon,  as  it  is  universally  called  in  the  South ;  and  whenever 
by  rare  chance  a  beefsteak  found  its  way  to  the  table,  it  had  been  remorselessly 
fried  until  not  a  particle  of  juice  remained  in  its  substance. 

People  who  subsist  upon  such  food  as  this  must  of  necessity  use  some  stimu- 
lant, and  they  make  up  in  corn  whiskey  and  leaf  tobacco  what  they  lack  in 
nourishing  meats,  good  soups,  and  a  general  variety  of  vegetables.  Wherever 
culture  and  refinement  prevail,  however,  there  one  finds  the  best  of  cookery, 
an  educated  taste  in  wines,  and  a  thorough  appreciation  of  good  things. 


LXXXIX. 

IMMIGRATION  —  THE     NEED     OF    CAPITAL — DIVISION     OF     THE 
NEGRO     VOTE — THE     SOUTHERN     LADIES. 

THERE  is  much  that  is  discouraging  in  the  present  condition  of  the  South, 
but  no  one  is  more  loth  than  the  Southerner  to  admit  the  impossibility 
of  its  thorough  redemption.  The  growth  of  manufactures  in  the  Southern  States, 
while  insignificant  as  compared  with  the  gigantic  development  in  the  North  and 
West,  is  still  highly  encouraging;  and  it  is  actually  true  that  manufactured 
articles  formerly  sent  South  from  the  North  are  now  made  in  the  South  to  be 
shipped  to  Northern  buyers. 

There  is  at  least  good  reason  to  hope  that  in  a  few  years  immigration  will 
pour  into  the  fertile  fields  and  noble  valleys  and  along  the  grand  streams  of  the 
South,  assuring  a  mighty  growth.  The  Southern  people,  however,  will  have  to 
make  more  vigorous  efforts  in  soliciting  immigration  than  they  have  thus  far 
shown  themselves  capable  of,  if  they  intend  to  compete  with  the  robust  assurance 
of  Western  agents  in  Europe.  Texas  and  Virginia  do  not  need  to  exert  them- 
selves, for  currents  of  immigrants  are  now  flowing  steadily  to  them;  and,  as  has 
been  seen  in  the  North-west,  one  immigrant  always  brings,  sooner  or  later,  ten 
in  his  wake.  But  the  cotton  States  need  able  and  efficient  agents  in  Europe 
to  explain  thoroughly  the  nature  and  extent  of  their  resources,  and  to  counteract 
the  effect  of  the  political  misrepresentation  which  is  so  conspicuous  during  every 
heated  campaign,  and  which  never  fails  to  do  those  States  incalculable  harm. 
The  mischief  which  the  grinding  of  the  outrage  mill  by  cheap  politicians,  in  the 
vain  hope  that  it  might  serve  their  petty  ends,  at  the  elections  of  1874,  did  such 
noble  commonwealths  as  Alabama,  Georgia,  and  Mississippi,  can  hardly  be 
estimated. 

The  Italians  have  been  favorably  looked  upon  by  the  Southerners  as  possible 
immigrants,  and  many  planters  in  some  of  the  States  have  offered  them  liberal 
inducements  to  settle  on  the  lands  which  now  lie  wholly  uncultivated;  but  it  will 
probably  be  some  years  before  any  considerable  body  of  Italian  settlers  take  up 
those  lands.  Many  foreign  immigrants  show  an  indisposition  to  settle  among 
the  negroes,  and  an  especial  unwillingness  to  accept  thp  wages  offered  them 
by  the  old  school  of  planters — namely,  a  trivial  sum  yearly,  and  the  rations 
of  meal,  pork,  and  molasses,  with  which  the  negro  is  easily  contented.  The 
immigration  question  can  only  be  settled  by  time  ;  but  an  expose  of  the  material 
resources  of  the  South  is  an  important  aid  to  such  settlement,  and  I  have 
endeavored,  in  the  foregoing  pages,  to  give  some  adequate  idea  of  those 
resources,  and  the  possibility  of  their  development.     The  attentive  reader  of  this 


NEED     OF     CAPITAL  —  DIVISION     OF     THE     NEGRO     VOTE.  793 

book  will  not  fail  to  discover  that  the  mineral  wealth  ascertained  since  the 
war  to  exist  in  some  of  the  States  of  the  South  is  likely  to  be  of  far  more 
importance  to  their  future  than  all  the  broad  cotton- fields,  once  their  sole 
dependence. 

Until  her  people  have  recovered  from  the  exhaustion  consequent  on  the  war, 
capital  is  and  will  be  the  crying  want  of  the  South.  The  North  will  continue 
to  furnish  some  portion  of  that  capital,  but  will  be  largely  checked  in  its  invest- 
ments in  that  direction,  as  it  has  been  heretofore,  by  its  lack  of  confidence  in  the 
possibility  of  a  solution  of  the  political  difficulties. 

If  we  may  rely  upon  the  figures  given  in  the  last  census,  the  black  race  is 
increasing  in  numbers.  Many  travelers  through  the  South,  however,  have 
expressed  a  contrary  opinion,  some  enthusiastic  correspondents  asserting  that 
the  negroes,  by  flocking  into  the  large  cities,  and  there  living  in  idleness  and 
vice,  are  contracting  the  seeds  of  disease,  which  will  eventually  sweep  the  race 
away.  But  in  spite  of  the  fact  that  on  many  of  the  plantations  foeticide,  which 
in  the  days  of  slavery  was  of  course  almost  unknown  among  the  negroes,  has 
become  quite  common,  there  seems  no  good  reason  to  doubt  that  their  numbers 
have  increased  nearly  half  a  million  within  ten  years.  The  black  population  will 
long  be  migratory,  and  will  show  the  same  tendency  which  has  been  so  noticeable 
since  the  war  to  seek  the  attractive  life  of  the  town. 

Still,  as  white  families  are,  as  a  rule,  much  larger  in  the  South  than  in  the 
North,  and  as  the  increase  of  the  native  Caucasian  population  there  is,  on  the 
whole,  greater  than  in  any  other  section  of  the  country,  there  is  not  much 
danger  of  the  Africanization  of  any  of  the  States  of  the  South.  The  whites  and 
blacks  will  have  to  learn  to  live  and  vote  amicably  together,  and  in  time  they 
will  do  so. 

As  soon  as  the  negro  vote  in  the  South  is  divided,  and  the  black  man  learns 
to  respect  the  merits  of  a  candidate  in  spite  of  his  political  complexion,  there 
will  be  but  little  of  the  trouble  now-a-days  so  conspicuous  in  Louisiana,  Alabama, 
and  some  of  the  other  States.  Within  the  last  few  months  the  South  Carolina 
Conservatives  have  frankly  allied  themselves  with  those  of  the  negroes  who  have 
shown  a  disposition  to  encourage  honest  government  in  the  State,  and  this  is  a 
movement  which  will  be  general  throughout  the  South  as  the  abuses  of  recon- 
struction are  corrected,  and  some  of  the  more  odious  carpet-baggers,  who  have 
arrayed  the  negro  wrongfully  against  the  principal  property-holders,  are 
summarily  dismissed  from  the  arena  of  politics. 

The  South  can  never  be  cast  in  the  same  mould  as  the  North.  Its  origin 
was  too  different;  it  will  not  be  thoroughly  emancipated  from  the  influence  of  the 
old  system  for  several  generations.  It  will  still  cherish  some  prejudices  against 
that  utter  freedom  of  speech,  that  devotion  to  "  isms,"  and  possibly  that  intense 
desire  for  immediate  material  development  that  distinguish  the  North;  but  it 
will  be  progressive,  more  progressive  and  liberal  every  year.  Its  provincialisms 
will  fade  gradually  away ;  its  educational  facilities,  despite  the  occasional 
hindrances  imposed  by  such  unwise  manoeuvres  as  the  projected  passage  of  the 
Civil  Rights  bill,  will  increase  and  flourish.     The  negro  will  get  justice  from  the 


794  •  T-HE     SOUTHERN     LADIES. 

lower  classes  of  whites  as  soon  as  those  classes  are  touched  by  the  liberalizing 
influences  of  the  times.  There  is,  of  course,  still  much  objection  to  sitting  with 
him  on  juries,  or  otherwise  acknowledging  his  equality. 

It  is  not  the  province  of  this  volume  to  indulge  in  theories  as  to  the  grave 
dangers  which  many  politicians  fancy  still  environ  the  Southern  question,  nor  is 
it  important  to  speculate  upon  the  possible  determination  on  the  part  of  the 
planters  to  demand  compensation  some  day  for  their  emancipated  slaves,  or 
to  hint  that  they  may  try  to  establish  a  labor  system  which  shall  relegate  the 
negro  to  serfdom.  Time  alone  can  disclose  the  role  which  the  Southern  Con- 
servative will  play  when  he  returns  to  power. 

The  Southern  ladies  during  the  trying  years  since  the  war  have  developed 
many  noble  qualities.  It  is  hardly  necessary  to  eulogize  their  beauty,  their  wit, 
their  vivacity,  or  even  to  hint  that  they  still  cherish  a  few  of  the  animosities 
which  their  husbands,  brothers,  and  lovers  have  long  ago  laid  aside.  It  is  but 
natural  that  they  should  yet  feel  some  of  the  bitterness  of  the  war,  for  latterly 
its  burdens  have  fallen  quite»as  heavily  upon  them  as  upon  the  survivors  of  the 
Confederate  ranks.     They  have  toiled  unceasingly  and  uncomplainingly. 

The  frankness  and  earnestness  with  which  these  ladies  accepted  a  changed 
order  of  things,  the  smile  with  which  they  have  cheered  the  humble  homes  for 
which  many  of  them  have  been  compelled  to  leave  noble  mansions,  and  the 
charity  and  kindliness  that  they  have  shown  toward  their  ex-slaves,  entitle  them 
to  the  highest  honor.  They  have  not  been  ashamed  to  teach  negro  schools 
now  and  then  ;  they  have  contentedly  worn  calico  instead  of  satin  when  rude 
poverty  made  it  necessary,  and  they  have  graced  with  the  nameless  charm  of 
their  manner  circumstances  which  have  made  many  men  harsh  and  sour  for 
life.  It  is  but  natural  that,  as  they  stray  among  the  graves  of  the  loved  and  lost, 
or  amid  the  ruins  of  their  homes  and  hopes,  they  should  sometimes  recall  with 
strange  affection  the  memory  of  a  lost  and  mistaken  cause,  to  which  they  gave 
themselves  with  a  passionate  devotion  which  has  few  parallels  in  the  history  of 
the  world. 


xc. 

RAMBLES     IN     VIRGINIA — FREDERICKSBURG — ALEXANDRIA. 

MOUNT     VERNON — ARLINGTON. 

THE  journey  from  Richmond  to  Washington,  via  the  battle-scarred  town  of 
Fredericksburg,  takes  one  through  Henry,  Hanover,  Caroline,  Spott- 
sylvania,  Stafford,  Prince  William  and  Fairfax  counties.  This  route  is  now  a 
favorite  one  from  Wilmington  in  North  Carolina,  and  other  large  cities  in  the 
Southern  Atlantic  States,  to  the  North,  and  sleeping-cars  daily  cross  the  Rappa- 
hannock, which  a  few  years  ago  was  red  with  the  blood  of  Northern  soldiers. 
In  the  vicinity  of  Ashland,  the  site  of  a  flourishing  Methodist  college,  fifteen 
miles  from  Richmond,  there  are  thousands  of  uncultivated  acres  which  might 
readily  be  turned  into  profitable  farms.  The  birthplace  of  Henry  Clay  is  not 
far  from  Ashland.  Fredericksburg  is  a  venerable  town,  pleasantly  situated  on 
the  south  shore  of  the  Rappahannock,  seventy  miles  from  Washington.  The 
"  Falls,"  a  mile  above  the  place,  afford  an  extensive  water  power.  Falmouth, 
on  the  north  side  of  the  river  a  little  above  Fredericksburg,  is  a  small  village  of 
the  ordinary  Virginian  type. 

Fredericksburg  is,  historically,  one  of  the  most  interesting  places  in  Virginia. 
The  birthplace  of  George  Washington  is  near  the  town,  half  a  mile  from  the 
junction  of  Pope's  creek  with  the  Potomac,  in  Westmoreland  county,  on  the 
" Wakefield"  estate.  The  old  farm-house,  a  rude  building  with  enormous  stone 
chimneys  at  each  end,  in  which  Washington  was  born,  was  destroyed  some  time 
before  the  Revolution.  The  only  memorial  on  the  spot  to-day  is  a  freestone 
slab,  erected  by  George  Washington  Park  Custis  in  1815,  and  bearing  these 
words : 

"Here,  the  nth  of  February  (O.  S.), 
1732,  George  Washington 
was  born." 

Near  Fredericksburg,  too,  repose  the  remains  of  the  mother  of  Washington,  who 
lived  for  many  years  in  the  town.  Some  time  before  her  death,  she  selected  the 
spot,  and  often  retired  to  it  for  meditation  and  prayer.  In  1833  the  corner- 
stone of  a  fine  monument  was  laid  above  the  grave  by  Andrew  Jackson,  then 
President  of  the  United  States ;  but  the  monument  is  still  unfinished.  The 
house  in  which  the  last  memorable  interview  between  the  mother  and  her  distin- 
guished son  occurred  still  stands  in  Fredericksburg.  The  old  Masonic  Hall,  in 
which  Washington  was  initiated  into  the  Masonic  Order,  is  also  yet  standing. 

But  the  reverence  which  the  mass  of  Americans  a  generation  since  felt  for 
these  important  memorials  has  been  dulled  by  the  newer  and  sadder  souve- 
nirs which  fill  the  minds  of  all  visitors  to  the  Fredericksburg  of  to-day.     The 
51 


jg6  MARYE'S      HILL THE      WILDERNESS. 

heights  on  either  side  of  the  little  river  have  been  the  scene  of  one  of  the  great- 
est battles  in  our  history ;  the  old  town  has  echoed  to  the  noise  of  fratricidal 
strife,  has  been  riddled  by  shot  and  shell,  and  some  portions  of  it  have  been 
burned.  It  is  wonderful  that  it  was  not  entirely  torn  to  pieces  by  Burnside's 
guns  in  1862.  Many  a  European  village,  far  more  solidly  built,  was  crushed 
into  ruins  under  the  shock  of  battle  between  the  contending  hosts  in  the  last 
struggle  in  France,  while  Fredericksburg  yet  shows  a  smiling  front.  The  old 
steeples,  around  which  raged  tempests  of  bombs  and  bullets,  still  point  serenely 
heavenward ;  and  the  rows  of  houses  by  the  river,  past  which  went  the  torrent 
which  poured  up  Marye's  Hill  to  attack  the  Confederate  position,  seem  but 
little  damaged.  The  stranger  can  readily  convince  himself,  however,  that  the 
tide  of  battle  has  swept  over  Fredericksburg,  if  he  will  but  climb  the  hills 
which  lie  beyond  the  plain  at  the  rear  of  the  town — those  eminences  along 
which  Lee  posted  his  army  of  defense,  from  Hamilton's  Crossing  to  Marye's 
Hill.  There  he  will  find,  charmingly  laid  out  in  terraces  like  some  vast  garden, 
a  huge  national  cemetery,  where  many  thousand  soldiers  sleep  the  sleep  that 
knows  no  waking  upon  earth. 

At  the  foot  of  Marye's  Hill  may  still  be  seen  the  stone  wall  behind  which 
the  Confederate  infantry  were  posted  on  that  dread  day  in  1862  when  the 
Northern  troops,  time  and  time  again  repulsed,  were  finally  compelled,  by  the 
artillery  fire  from  the  hill,  to  retire  across  the  Rappahannock.  That  stone  wall  is 
a  monument  to  the  bravery  of  the  Irish  troops  who  there  fought  for  the  Union. 
If  mortal  men  could  have  taken  it,  it  would  have  been  theirs ;  but  it  was  an 
impregnable  position.  Blackened  with  smoke,  and  scarred  with  bullets,  it  is  a 
ghastly  reminder  of  the  days  when  Northern  Virginia  was  a  battle-ground  where 
two  giant  antagonists  had  declared  war  against  each  other  to  the  death.  Lee's 
Hill,  where  General  Lee  stood  during  the  fight  in  December  of  1862,  and 
Chatham,  on  the  north  side  of  the  river,  where  General  Burnside  had  his  head- 
quarters, are  interesting  points,  both  offering  a  good  view  of  the  surrounding 
country. 

A  journey  into  the  battle-grounds  of  the  "  Wilderness" — that  vast  tract 
stretching  southward  from  the  Rapidan,  and  westward  from  Mine  Run,  may 
be  readily  made  on  horseback  or  in  private  conveyance  from  Fredericksburg. 
The  Wilderness,  which  has  been  described  as  a  "darkling  wood"  covered  with 
"  a  dense  undergrowth  of  low-limbed  and  scraggy  pines,  stiff  and  bristling 
chincapins,  scrub  oaks,  and  hazel,"  is  not  looked  upon  with  much  affection  by 
Virginians,  as  the  lands  in  that  section  are  not  valuable.  On  the  road  to 
Chancellorsville  one  passes  Salem  Church ;  and  not  far  from  that  point  is  the 
"Mountain  Way"  estate,  where  General  Sedgwick  had  his  head-quarters  when 
he  was  fighting  his  way  to  Chancellorsville  in  1863.  The  view  of  Fredericks- 
burg, the  Rappahannock,  and  the  distant  summits  of  the  Blue  Ridge  from  this 
place,  is  delightful.  In  the  vicinity  of  Chancellorsville  one  may  still  see  the 
outlines  of  the  Federal  works,  the  tree  under  which  Stonewall  Jackson  lay  for 
a  time  after  he  received  his  fatal  wound,  the  old  Wilderness  Tavern,  and  the 
Wilderness  Church. 


LACK     OF     THRIFT.  797 

Hanover,  Caroline,  and  Spottsylvania  counties  produce  excellent  crops  of 
tobacco,  winter  wheat,  rye  and  Indian  corn ;  the  farmers  are  intelligent  and 
capable,  and  saw  enough  of  Northern  men  during  the  war  to  wear  away  a  good 
deal  of  their  old-time  prejudice  against  the  "Yankees."  There  are  still  large 
tracts,  of  unimproved  land  in  these  counties ;  industrious  and  frugal  immigrants 
can  readily  turn  them  into  paying  farms. 

The  old  town  of  Alexandria,  seated  on  the  Potomac  shore,  seven  miles  from 
Washington,  is  now  accessible  by  rail  from  Richmond.  Before  the  completion 
of  the  Richmond,  Fredericksburg  and  Potomac  railroad,  trains  from  the  Vir- 
ginian capital  stopped  at  Acquia  creek,  on  the  river,  whence  passengers  were 
conveyed  in  boats  to  Alexandria  and  Washington.  The  Orange,  Alexandria, 
and  Manassas  railroad  procures  for  Alexandria  trade  with  many  of  the  counties 
along  the  line,  and,  by  the  "Washington  and  Ohio,"  lays  hold  upon  fertile 
Halifax  and  Loudon  counties.  The  town  has  a  cotton-mill,  a  brewery,  some 
private  iron  workers  and  machinists,  a  few  repair  shops  for  railroad  works,  and 
it  makes  extensive  transfers  of  coal.  It  occupies  a  position  admirably  fitted  for 
large  industrial  activity.  Its  frontage  on  the  Potomac  is  better  than  that  of  any 
other  town  on  the  river,  and  yet  it  languishes.  Its  inhabitants  seem  to  lack  the 
vigor  and  the  enterprise  needed  to  seize  upon  and  improve  their  fine  advantages. 
They  are  in  the  attitude  of  waiting  for  something  to  turn  up,  yet  do  not  even 
display  the  impracticable  enthusiasm  of  Micawber  when  an  opportunity  presents 
itself.  The  streets  were  not  paved  until  a  Northern  officer,  during  the  occupa- 
tion in  war  times,  insisted  upon  having  a  pavement  of  cobble  stones  laid  down, 
and  met  the  expense  by  fines  levied  upon  whiskey- selling.  Few  repairs  have 
been  made,  and  the  avenues  are  filled  with  ruts  and  hollows.  The  inhabitants 
seem  to  feel,  with  regard  to  the  changed  order  of  things  upon  which  they  have 
fallen,  very  much  as  did  the  old  negro  whom  I  met  there  in  1869. 

"'Pears  like,  boss,"  said  the  venerable  darkey,  as  he  looked  up  the  river  toward 
the  dome  of  the  National  Capitol,  the  Mecca  of  his  dreams,  and  then  glanced 
over  his  broken  down  chest  and  withered  limbs,  "'pears  like  I  's  come  too  late 
for  de  good  times." 

One  sees  nerveless  unthrift  in  many  small  Virginian  towns.  It  seems  graven 
in  the  nature  of  whites  and  blacks.  An  occasional  conversation  with  the  negroes 
led  me  to  believe  that  they  offer  as  many  hindrances  to  the  advent  of  capital  as 
their  ex- masters  do.  Both  seem  suspicious  that,  some  improper  and  undue 
advantage  is  to  be  taken  of  them.  The  negro  appears  oftentimes  suspicious  of 
those  who  are  making  strenuous  endeavors  to  elevate  him  out  of  his  shiftless  and 
helpless  condition  into  something  like  manly  independence. 

Alexandria  was  once  a  part  of  the  District  of  Columbia,  but  was  retroceded 
to  Virginia  in  1846,  when  the  Old  Dominion  regained  all  the  territory  which 
had  before  been  national  ground.  The  town  was  founded  in  1748 ;  Washington 
was  a  frequent  visitor  there,  and  the  pew  in  which  he  used  to  sit,  in  Christ 
Church,  is  still  pointed  out.  The  hourly  steamboat  line  which  plies  between 
Washington  and  Alexandria  affords  communication  with  the  Washington  City 
and  Potomac  line  of  steamers,  with  Norfolk,  Philadelphia,  New  York  and  Boston. 


yg8  MOUNT     VERNON. 

A  new  commercial  exchange,  and  a  fine  Government  custom-house  and  post- 
office  have  recently  been  erected  in  the  town. 

In  summer  and  autumn  the  journey  down  the  Potomac  from  Washington  is 
usually  interesting.  There  is  a  certain  picturesqueness  in  the  great  stream  and 
the  quaint  towns  and  fortifications  along  its  banks ;  Forts  Foote  and  Washington, 
on  the  Maryland  side,  being  especially  noticeable.  On  the  little  steamer  which 
plies  regularly  to  and  from  Mount  Vernon,  the  old  home  of  the  Father  of  his 
Country,  may  sometimes  be  found  a  few  Virginians  clad  in  rusty  black,  who 
confidentially  discuss  with  the  stranger  the  painful  issues  of  the  present. 

Mount  Vernon  is  fifteen  miles  from  the  Capitol,  and  the  traveler  will  not  fail 
to  observe,  while  sailing  down  the  river,  that  the  fields  on  the  Virginia  side  have 
not  yet  recovered  from  the  devastation  of  war.  The  whole  country  has  the 
trampled  aspect  which  the  passage  of  the  myriads  of  men  and  horses,  and  the 
location  of  the  thousand  camps,  naturally  gave  it.  Fort  Washington,  on  the 
Maryland  side,  was  blown  up  in  1 8 14  when  the  British  occupied  Washington, 
but  is  now  thoroughly  restored.  On  a  fertile  slope  on  the  Virginia  shore,  in  the 
midst  of  noble  groves  and  on  a  pretty  lawn,  overlooking  the  wide  and  winding 
river,  one  may  see  here  and  there  a  few  substantial  mansions,  once  the  homes  of 
prosperous  planters.  The  woods  near  Mount  Vernon,  like  many  bits  of  forest 
along  the  Potomac,  are  untamed,  but  a  pretty  road  leads  up  the  hill-side  to 
the  tomb,  and  thence  wanders  to  the  lawn,  where  stands  the  Washington  mansion 
with  its  little  cupola,  its  quaint  roof  and  its  veranda  with  eight  stately  pillars. 

Nothing  can  be  simpler  than  the  tomb  in  which  the  first  President  of  the 
United  States  reposes.  It  is  of  quadrangular  form,  built  on  a  sloping  hill-side, 
painted  red  and  white,  a  high  iron  gate  guarding  the  entrance.  Above  the  gate 
is  the  inscription,  "Within  this  enclosure  rest  the  remains  of  General  George 
Washington."  There  is  no  attempt  at  decoration.  One  sees  nothing  but  two 
marble  coffins  lying  on  the  brick  floor ;  the  one  on  the  right  has  upon  its  lid  a 
spread  eagle,  a  flag  and  a  shield,  and  beneath  these  emblems  the  single  word, 
"Washington."  The  coffin  on  the  left  is  plain,  and  contains  the  remains  of 
Mrs.  Washington.  Above  the  door  which  opens  into  another  vault  are  the 
following  words : 

"  I  am  the  resurrection  and  the  life ;  he  that  believeth  in  me,  though  he  were 
dead,  yet  shall  he  live." 

Near  the  tomb  are  several  other  family  monuments,  much  more  showy  and 
pretentious  than  that  which  covers  the  mortal  remains  of  our  chief  patriot.  The 
■old  tomb,  in  which  the  body  of  Washington  remained  for  thirty  years,  was  situated 
between  the  present  vault  and  the  house. 

The  mansion  commands  a  fine  view  of  the  river,  and,  were  it  not  for  its  low 
ceilings  and  its  lack  of  all  the  comforts  of  modern  residences,  would  be  a  desirable 
country  residence  for  a  century  to  come ;  for,  although  it  is  now  more  than  one 
hundred  and  twenty-five  years  old,  it  is  still  solid  and  enduring.  The  wood  of 
which  the  house  is  built  is  cut  in  blocks  in  imitation  of  stone ;  on  the  sloping 
sides  of  the  roof  there  are  dormer  windows,  and  the  portico,  which  covers  the 
whole  front  of  the  building,  is  quite  imposing. 


ACQUIA      CREEK — POHICK.  799 

The  gardens  and  the  lawn  in  the  rear  of  the  house,  with  the  walks  ex- 
tending to  what  were  formerly  the  negro  quarters,  are  extensive  and  pleasant, 
and  one  or  two  colored  families  supply  the  visitor  with  luncheon,  and  nosegays 
from  the  garden.  Mrs.  Cunningham,  the  present  guardian  of  that  portion 
of  the  estate  purchased  by  the  patriotic  ladies  of  the  country  some  years 
ago  and  preserved  as  a  National  treasure,  lives  at  Mount  Vernon  some  portion 
of  the  year.  The  farms  round  about  are  owned  by  Northern  men,  and 
the  old  lordly  life  of  the  planter  and  country  gentleman,  which  prevailed  so 
extensively  in  all  that  region  when  Washington  inhabited  Mount  Vernon, 
has  passed  utterly  away.  The  whole  surroundings  of  the  estate  are  calculated 
to  remind  one  of  the  English  country  seats  which  still  remain,  in  some  parts 
of  England,  much  as  they  were  two  centuries  ago.  The  quaint  staircases, 
and  odd  little  angular  passages  in  the  mansion,  are  thronged  by  fashionable 
tourists  from  the  cities,  who  never  fail  to  express  their  wonder  that  the 
Father  of  his  Country   lived  in  such  a  simple,  unostentatious  style. 

Below  Mount  Vernon  on  the  Virginia  side  one  comes  upon  naked  sand- 
bluffs  standing  out  into  the  stream  here  and  there ;  on  shad  and  herring 
fishing  stations,  where  in  spring  time,  when  the  herring  shoals  come  in, 
hundreds  of  fishermen  are  busy ;  and  upon  forests,  where  in  autumn  the 
hickories  and  cedars,  the  oaks  and  the  ashes,  the  chestnuts  and  the  beeches 
clothe  the  hill-sides  in  brilliant  colors.  At  Acquia  Creek,  a  dreary  and  forlorn 
little  place  to-day,  but  an  important  military  depot  during  the  war,  one  may 
take  the  railroad  for  Fredericksburg.  In  the  vicinity  of  Acquia  Creek  there 
were  many  Confederate  batteries,  which  of  course  did  their  best  to  injure  the 
Federal  shipping  on  the  Potomac  in  the  early  years  of  the  war. 

A  journey  by  land  from  Mount  Vernon  to  either  Alexandria  or  Fred- 
ericksburg may  be  made  along  the  main  road,  which  extends  through  a  wild 
country,  and  which  those  who  have  traversed  it  declare  to  be  not  only  the 
worst  road  in  any  country,  but  probably  much  worse  now  than  it  was  when 
Washington  was  wont  to  ride  over  it. 

On  the  road  from  Mount  Vernon  to  Fredericksburg  one  passes  Pohick, 
where  stands  a  ruined  church,  which  the  family  of  Washington  attended  until 
the  close  of  the  Revolution ;  and  crosses  a  pretty  river,  called  Occoquan,  which 
empties  into  the  Potomac  near  the  headland  known  as  High  Point,  upon  which, 
during  the  fall  after  the  battle  of  Bull  Run,  the  Confederates  established  their 
nearest  river  battery  to  Washington. 

Southward,  on  the  Washington  City,  Virginia  Midland  and  Great  Southern 
railroad,  is  Clifton  Station,  twelve  miles  from  the  old  Bull  Run  battle-field. 
This  was  a  famous  depot  during  the  war  for  army  supplies,  and  is  now  a 
prosperous  summer  resort,  frequented  by  visitors  from  Northern  cities.  In 
Prince  William  county,  on  the  same  line  of  rail,  is  the  flourishing  village  of 
Manassas.  It  is  situated  on  the  summit  of  a  high  table-land,  twenty-seven 
miles  from  Alexandria,  and  commands  a  beautiful  view  of  the  surrounding 
country.  Six  miles  to  the  right  of  it,  in  the  direction  of  Fairfax,  the  first 
battle  of  Manassas  was  fought,  and  here  and  there  a  ruined  earthwork  marks 


8oo 


POINTS      OF     INTEREST BATTLE      SITES. 


the  site  of  the  old  struggle.  In  1868  there  was  not  a  fence  or  a  building  on 
the  spot  where  the  town  now  stands,  but  since  that  time  many  Northern  and 
Western  people  have  flocked  into  it.  The  centre  of  a  prosperous  county  with 
ample  facilities  for  transportation,  with  a  fine  free  school  system,  and  with  the 
best  of  hematite  iron  ore  in  its  vicinity,  it  can  but  have  a  prosperous  future. 
Throughout  this  entire  section  the  tide  of  battle  raged  during  1862  and  1863. 
Hooker  and  Ewell,  Warren  and  Hill,  marched  and  countermarched  over  the 
devastated  country,  which  to-day  is  rapidly  recovering  from  the  shock  of  war. 

In  Fauquier  county  are  situated  the  Warrenton  White  Sulphur  Springs, 
where  formerly  a  brilliant  society  annually  gathered.  Warrenton,  fifty  miles 
from  Alexandria,  now  receives  many  fashionable  visitors  yearly.  Nine  miles 
from  the  town  is  the  birthplace  of  Chief-Justice  Marshall.  In  Culpepper  county 
stands  the    town  of  Culpepper,  founded   in   1759,  and  first  named  after  Lord 


The  Potomac  and  Washington  —  Seen  from  Arlington,  Virginia. 

Fairfax,  the  original  proprietor  of  the  section.  The  little  town  looks  down 
upon  the  beautiful  and  vast  extent  of  the  Blue  Ridge,  has  a  handsome  and 
costly  court-house,  and  many  prosperous  manufactories,  and  is  also  the  site 
of  the  annual  fair  of  the  Piedmont  Agricultural  Society,  of  which  General 
Kemper,  the  present  Governor  of  Virginia,  was,  for  two  years,  the  chief 
executive  officer.  Near  Mitchell's  Station  the  battle  known  as  that  of  Cedar 
Mountain  was  fought  in  August,  1862.  Magnetic  iron  ores  and  fine  grass- 
lands are  gradually  attracting  Northern  immigration  to  the  surroundings  of 
the  old  battle-field.  From  Culpepper  the  Washington  City,  Virginia  Midland 
and  Great  Southern  railroad  runs  through  Gordonsville,  Charlottesville  and 
Lynchburg  to  Danville,  four  miles  from  the  North  Carolina  line  in  Pittsylvania 
county,  whence  it  connects  with  the  Piedmont  air  line  via  Charlotte  in  North 
Carolina,  to  Atlanta  in  Georgia. 


STRASBURG OFFICERS'     HILL.  801 

The  railroad  known  as  the  Manassas  Division,  and  running  through  the  town 
of  Manassas,  through  Warren,  Shenandoah,  and  other  counties  in  Northern 
Virginia,  passes  Front  Royal,  near  which  is  the  finest  and  most  profitable  vine- 
yard in  the  whole  South.  The  Northern  visitor,  while  at  Front  Royal,  has  his 
attention  directed  to  the  exploits  of  General  Stonewall  Jackson,  who,  in  1862, 
in  a  severe  battle  near  this  town,  drove  General  Banks  out  of  the  Shenandoah 
valley.  At  Rivington  Station,  the  junction  of  the  North  and  South  forks  of  the 
Shenandoah  river,  much  of  the  brown  hematite  and  magnetic  iron  ore  which 
comes  down  the  river  in  flat-boats  from  the  counties  of  Rockingham,  Page  and 
Warren,  is  received  and  exported.  A  joint-stock  company  of  Northern  capital- 
ists, with  a  million  dollars  of  capital  stock,  is  now  operating  in  this  region. 

The  traveler  along  the  romantic  gaps  of  the  Shenandoah  passes  the  sites 
of  the  battles  of  Chester  Gap,  Cedar  Creek  and  Front  Royal,  and,  straying 
by  the  ruins  of  burned  bridges  and  devastated  farms,  cannot  but  wonder  that 
the  Virginians  of  the  section  have  so  soon  recovered  their  courage  and  shown  a 
disposition  to  rebuild  after  the  prostrating  struggle.  Five  miles  from  Stras- 
burg,  the  present  western  terminus  of  the  "  Manassas  Division,"  Ashby's 
Confederate  cavalry  and  Banks's  infantry  fought  a  sharp  battle  in  May  of  1862, 
and  a  little  north  of  this,  at  Cedarville,  that  dashing  and  gallant  West  Virginian, 
McCausland,  met,  in  a  severe  fight,  part  of  General  Phil  Sheridan's  forces. 
Shenandoah  county,  originally  called  Dunmore,  after  the  Tory  Lord  of  that 
name,  but  later  more  properly  named  after  the  beautiful  and  picturesque 
Shenandoah  river,  which  wanders  by  cliff  and  through  meadow  within  its  limits, 
is  extremely  fertile.  Strasburg  was  so  named  because  its  original  settlers  came 
from  Germany.  It  will  in  due  time  be  a  place  of  great  importance,  and  the 
Capon  and  Orkney  Springs  near  it  will  give  it  a  good  tide  of  summer  travel. 
One  mile  south  of  the  town  is  Officers'  Hill,  where  Early  and  Sheridan  met  in 
a  tremendous  fight  in  September  of  1864,  and  in  October  of  the  same  year 
severe  battles  were  fought  in  the  immediate  vicinity.  This  region  is  one  of  the 
most  beautiful  in  Virginia.  The  rugged 'and  mighty  slopes  of  the  Massanuttan 
contain  much  delightful  and  wild  scenery,  and  near  Newmarket  Station  there  is 
a  beautiful  cataract. 

Along  these  lines  of  rail  many  fine  bodies  of  land  are  offered  to  capitalists 
and  actual  settlers.  Many  of  the  lands  are  admirably  adapted  to  the  production 
of  the  grape ;  and  the  fine  air,  the  beautiful  springs  of  fresh  water,  the  short 
and  mild  winters,  the  long  and  equable  summers,  offer  superior  attractions  to 
the  emigrant  from  England  or  from  middle  Europe. 

The  traveler  along  the  Potomac  will  do  well  to  scale  the  hill  opposite  George- 
town, in  the  District  of  Columbia,  on  which  stands  Arlington  House.  The 
famous  mansion,  once  the  residence  of  George  Washington  Parke  Custis,  one  of 
the  last  survivors  of  the  Washington  family,  stands  more  than  two  hundred  feet 
above  the  Potomac ;  and  from  its  massive  portico  one  can  look  out  over  Wash- 
ington, and  can  see  the  white  dome  of  the  National  Capitol  gleaming  through 
dark  green  foliage.  Arlington  was,  for  many  years  before  the  late  war,  a  part  of 
the  estate  of  General  Robert  E.  Lee,  but  when  that  valiant  soldier  unsheathed  his 


802 


THE     CEMETERIES     AT     ARLINGTON. 


sword  in  the  Confederate  cause,  the  grand  old  mansion  and  the  beautiful  grounds 
about  it  were  confiscated  to  Government  use,  and  are  now  held  on  an  arrear  of 
taxes  title.  The  ravages  of  war  have  destroyed  many  of  the  beauties  of  the 
parks  and  gardens.  To-day,  the  fields  of  Arlington,  which  the  proud  leader  of 
the  Confederate  hosts  cherished  as  one  of  his  favorite  resorts,  are  covered  with 
national  cemeteries.  Fifteen  thousand  graves,  on  the  head-boards  over  many 
of  which  is  written  the  word  "Unknown,"  dot  the  slopes  and  lawns.  Near  the 
mansion  is    a  short  but  heavy  granite   monument,  on  which   is    the    following 

inscription : 

"  Beneath   this  stone 

repose   the  bones  of  two   thousand   one  hundred  and  eleven 

unknown  soldiers,  gathered  after  the  war,  from 

the  fields  of  Bull  Run  and  the  route  to  the  Rappahannock. 

Their  remains  could  not  be   identified,   but  their  names   and   deaths 

are  recorded  in  the  archives  of  the 

country,  and  its  grateful  citizens  honor  them 

as  of  their  noble  army  of  martyrs. 

May  they  rest  in  peace. 

Sept.  A.  D.  1866." 

Thousands  of  negro  soldiers  and  "contrabands"  who  died  during  the  war,  are 
also  buried  at  Arlington.  In  the  eastern  division  of  the  largest  of  the  three 
cemeteries  are  monuments  to  the  memory  of  George  Washington  Parke  Custis 
and  Mary  his  wife.  Thousands  of  visitors  yearly  come  and  go,  over  the  hills, 
under  the  oaks,  and  among  the  graves  at  Arlington;  and  now  and  then  old 
soldiers,  who  for  long  years  fought  fiercely  against  each  other  in  opposing  ranks, 
pause  in  friendly  converse  by  some  grassy  mound,  beneath  which  sleeps  an 
unknown  and  forgotten  member  of  the  great  army  that  has  passed  into  the 
silence  and  shadows  beyond. 


APPENDIX. 


FACTS  AND    FIGURES  CONCERNING  THE  EX-SLAVE  STATES, 
AND  DELAWARE  AND  THE  DISTRICT  OF  COLUMBIA. 


POPULATION. 
Compiled    from    the    United.    States    Census    of    1870. 


Alabama . 
Arkansas 
Delaware 
Florida  .  . 


Georgia. 


Kentucky 

Louisiana 

Maryland 

Mississippi 

Missouri 

North  Carolina . 
South  Carolina. 
Tennessee  ■.-...., 
Texas 


STATES. 


West  Virginia. ...'.. 

District  of  Columbia . 

Totals. 


WHITES. 


521,384. 
362,115. 

102,221 . 

96,057. 
638,926. 


1,098,692. 

.  362,065 . 
.  605,497. 
.  382,896. 
1,603,146. 
.  678,470.. 


v  289,667. 
..936,119. 


564,700. 


Virginia .712,089 


424,033. 
88,288. 


■9*466,355 


BLACKS. 


.475,501 
.122,169 
•  22,794 
.  91,689 
.545,142 
.222,210 
.364,210 

•I75.39I 
.444,201 
.118,071 
.391,650 
.415,814 
■322,331 

•253,475 

.512,841 

.  17,980 

43,404 


4,538,782 


APPENDIX. 


MANUFACTURES   OF    COTTON    IN    THE    UNITED    STATES. 
NEW    ENGLAND    STATES. 


STATES. 

i860. 

RAW    MATERIAL    USED. 

1870. 
RAW    MATERIAL     USED. 

POUNDS. 

VALUE. 

POUNDS. 

VALUE. 

Maine 

New  Hampshire 

Vermont 

23,733,165 
51,002,324 
1,447,250 
'     134,012,759 
41,614,797 
31,891,011 

$3,319,335 

7,128,196 

181,030 

17,214,592 
5,799,223 
4,028,406 

25,887,771 
41,469,719 
1,235,652 
130,654,040 
44,630,787 
31,747,309 

$6,746,780 

12,318,867 

292,269 

37,371,599 

13,268,315 

8,818,651 

Massachusetts 

Rhode  Island 

Connecticut 

Total 

283,701,306 

$37,670,782 

275,625,278 

$78,816,482 

MIDDLE   STATES. 


New  York 

Pennsylvania 

New  Jersey 

Delaware 

Maryland 

District  of  Columbia. 

Total 


23,945,627 
37,496,203 

9,094,649 

3,403,000 

12,880,119 

294,117 


$3,061,105 

7,386,213 

1,165,435 

570,102 

1,698,413 

47,403 


87,H3,7i5  $13,928,671 


24,783,351 

32,953,318 

7,920,035 

2,587,615 

12,693,647 


80,937,966 


$6,990,626 

10,724,052 

1,964,758 

704,733 
3,409,426 


$23,793,595 


WESTERN    STATES. 


Ohio 

3,192,500 

1,813,944 

95,000 

$374,100 

229,925 

ii,93° 

2,226,400 

2,070,318 

857,000 

20,000 

23,500 

'  2,196,600 

1,584,625 

$493,740 
542,875 
177,525 
4,95o 
7,051 
481,745 
375,048 

Indiana 

Illinois 

Iowa 

Utah 

12,000 

990,000 

1,826,000 

6,600 
110,000 

214,755 

Missouri 

Kentucky 

Total 

7,929,444 

$946,710 

8,908,443 

$2,082,934 

SOUTHERN    STATES. 


Virginia 

North  Carolina 
South  Carolina 

Georgia 

Florida 

Alabama 

Louisiana 

Texas 

Mississippi  .... 

Arkansas   

Tennessee 


Total ; 

Total  United  States 


7,544,297 
5,54o,738 
3,978,o6i 

i3,907,904 

200,000 

5,246,800 

1,995,700 

588,000 

638,800 

187,500 

4,072,710 


43,960,510 


422,704,975 


$811,187 
622,363 

431,525 

1,466,375 

23,000 

617,633 

226,000 

64,140 

79,800 

11,600 

.384,548 


h739,37i 


$57,285,534 


4,255,383 

4,238,276 

4,756,823 

10,921,176 

3,249,523 

748,525 

1,079,118 

580,764 

66,400 

•2,872,582 


32,768,570 


398,248,257 


$937,820 
963,809 
761.469 

2,504,758 

764,965 
161,485 
216,519 
123,568 
13,780 
59S,78Q 


$7,042,962 


>m,735>973 


APPENDIX. 


Ill 


STATISTICS  *  OF    THE    MANUFACTURES    OF    COTTON    IN    THE 

UNITED    STATES. 


NEW    ENGLAND    STATES. 


STATES. 

1850. 

i860. 

1870. 

Value  of  Product. 

Value  of  Product. 

Value  of  Product. 

$2,630,616 

8,861,749 

280,300 

21,394,401 
6,495,972 
4,122,952 

$6,235,623 

13,6995994 

357,450 

38,004,255 

12,151,191 

8,911,387 

$11,844,181 

16,999,672 

546,510 

5954935 153 
22,049,203 
14,026,334 

Massachusetts 

Total 

$43,785,990 

$7953595900 

$i24,759>o53 

MIDDLE    STATES. 


New  York 

Pennsylvania 

New  Jersey 

Delaware 

Maryland 

District  of  Columbia. 


Total , 


$5,019,323 
5,812,126 
1,289,648 

538,439 

2,021,396 

100,000 


.  $14,780,932 


$6,676,878 

13,650,114 

2,217,728 

941,703 

2,973,877 
74,40O 


$26,534,700 


$11,178,211 

17,490,080 

4,015,768 

1,060,898 

4,832,808 


$38,587,765 


WESTERN    STATES. 


Ohio 

$594,204 
86,660 

$723,5oo 

344,35° 
18,987 

$681,335 
778,047 
279,000 
7,000 
16,803 
798,850 
251,550 

Indiana * 

Illinois 

Iowa 

Utah 

10,000 
230,000 

315,270 

Missouri 

142,900 
445,639 

Kentucky 

Total 

$1,269,403 

$1,642,107 

$2,792,585 

SOUTHERN    STATES. 


Virginia 

$1,446,109 

985,411 

842,440 

1,395,056 

49,920 

398,585 

$1,489,971 

1,046,047 

713,050 

2,371,207 

40,000 

1,040,147 

466,500 

80,695 

176,328 

23,000 

698,122 

$1,435,800 
1,345,052 
1,529,930 
3,648,973 

North  Carolina 

South  Carolina 

Georgia 

Florida 

Alabama 

1,088,767 
251,550 
374,598 

234,445 

22,362 

941,542 

Louisiana 

Texas 

Mississippi 

22,000 

17,360 

508,481 

Arkansas 

Tennessee 

Total 

$5,665,362 

$8,145,067 

$10,873,019 

Total  United  States 

$65,501,687 

$115,681,774 

$177,022,422 

IV 


APPENDIX. 


COTTON 

TRADE  OF 

THE  UNITED    STATES  FOR  FORTY-EIGHT  YEARS. 

AVERAGE 

AVERAGE 

AVERAGE 
PRICE 

NET 

PRICE 

YEARS 

PRODUCTION. 

CONSUMPTION. 

EXPORTS. 

WEIGHT 

PER  LB.   IN 

PER  LB. 

ENDING 

PER   BALE. 

NEW   YORK. 

IN  LIVER- 

AUGUST 31. 

POOL. 

BALES. 

BALES. 

BALES. 

LBS. 

CENTS. 

PENCE. 

1825-26 

720,027 

12.19 

5.85 

1826-27 

975^31 

149,516 

854,000 

331 

9.29 

5 

79 

1827-28 

720,593 

120,593 

600,000 

335 

IO.32 

5 

84 

1828-29 

870,415 

118,853 

740,000 

341 

9-88 

5 

32 

1829-3O 

976,845 

126,512 

839,000 

339 

10.04 

6 

44 

183O-3I 

1,038,847 

182,142 

773,000' 

341 

9.71 

5 

72 

183I-32 

987,477 

173,800 

892,000 

360 

9-38 

6 

22 

1832-33 

1,070,438 

194,412 

867,000 

350 

12.32 

7 

87 

1833-34 

1,205,394 

196,413 

1,028,000 

363 

12:90 

8 

10 

1834-35 

1,254,328 

216,888 

1,023,500 

367 

17-45 

9 

13 

1835-36 

1,360,725 

236,733 

I,Il6,000 

373 

16.50 

8 

97 

1836-37, 

1,423,930 

222,540 

I,l69,000 

379 

13  25 

6 

09 

1837-38 

1,801,497 

246,063 

1,575,000 

379 

10,14 

6 

28 

1838-39 

1,360,532 

276,Ol8 

1,074,000 

384 

13  36 

7 

19 

1839-40 

2,177,835 

295,193 

1,870,000 

383 

8.92 

5 

42 

184O-4I 

1,634,954 

267,850 

1,313,500 

394 

9.50 

5 

73 

1841-42 

1,683,574 

267,850 

1,465,500 

397 

7-85 

4 

86 

1842-43 

2,378,875 

325,129 

2,010,000 

409 

7.25 

4 

37 

1843-44 

2,030,409 

346,750 

1,629,500 

412 

7-73 

4 

7i 

1844-45 

2,394,503 

389,000 

2,083,700 

415 

5  63 

3 

92 

1845-46 

3,IOO,537 

422,600 

1,666,700 

411 

7.87 

4 

80 

1846-47 

1,778,651 

428,000 

1,241,200 

43i 

11 .21 

6 

03 

1847-48 

2,439,786 

6l6,044 

1,858,000 

417 

8.03 

3 

93 

1848-49 

2,866,938 

642,485 

2,228,000 

436 

7-55 

4 

09 

1849-50 

2,233,718 

613,498 

1,590,200      f 

429 

i2,-34 

7 

10 

1850-5I 

2,454,442 

485,614 

I,988,7IO 

416 

12. 14 

5 

5i 

I85I-52 

3,I26,3IO 

689,603 

2,443,646 

428 

3i  9-50 

5 

05 

1852-53 

3,416,214 

803,725 

2,528,400 

428 

11.02 

5 

54 

1853-54 

3,074,979 

737,236 

2,319,148 

430 

10.97 

5 

3i 

1854-55 

2,982,634 

706,417 

2,244,209 

434 

10.39 

5 

60 

1855-56 

3,665,557 

770,739 

2,954,6o6 

420 

10.30 

6 

22 

1856-57 

3,093,737 

819,936 

2,252,657 

444 

I3-5I 

7 

73 

1857-58 

3,257,339 

595,562 

2,590,455 

442 

12.23 

6 

9i 

1858-59 

4,Ol8,9I4 

927,651 

3,021,403 

447^ 

12.08 

6 

68 

1859-60 

4,86l,292 

978,043 

3,774,173 

461 

11 .00 

5 

97 

l86o-6l 

3,849,469 

843,740 

3,127,568 

477 

13.01 

8 

50 

l86l-62 

31.29 

18 

37 

1862-63 

67.21 

22 

46 

1863-64 

101.50 

27 

17 

1864-65 

83-38 

!9 

11 

1865-66 

2,269,316 

666, 100 

1,554,664 

441 

43.20 

15 

30 

1866-67 

2,097,254 

770,030 

1,557,054 

444 

31-59 

10 

98 

1867-68 

2,519,554 

906,636 

I,655,8l6 

445 

24.85 

10 

52 

1868-69 

2,366,467 

926,374 

1,465,880 

444 

29.01 

12 

12 

I869-70 

3,122,551 

865,160 

2,206,480 

440 

23.98 

9 

89 

187O-7I 

4,362,317 

1,110,196 

3,166,742 

442 

16.95 

8 

55 

187I-72 

3,OH,35I 

1,237,330 

1,957,314 

443 

20.48 

10 

78 

1872-73 

3,930,508 

1,201,127 

2,679,986 

464 

18.15 

9.65 

*> 


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